Develop Bugs

removing non used apps from a rom ?

hello
when i want to install a new rom
can i remove without any risk from the system directory all the apps and widgets i never use (such as facebook, flickr, etc...) before installing the rom ?
thank you

I would like to know this too... apparently there are some "adb commands" you can use??
Thanks

youll have to resign zip file after, otherwise installation will be interupted due to missing files.
2nd way to get rid from these apps is to remove them using adb, after installation

shoonari said:
2nd way to get rid from these apps is to remove them using adb, after installation
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can you please post instructions how to do this one?
Thanks

1.boot to modified recovery
2.connect to pc
3.adb shell
4.mount /system
5.cd /system/app
6.ls -this will list all your apps installed, chack it and:
7.rm Facebook.apk (for example) case sensitive!
or
rm *Facebook* -this will remove everything connected to Facebookdex files,widgets, etc...

Yes you can remove files from a .zip before flashing. Just delete them. Then just before you flash, disable verification in the custom recovery. It will flash and ignore any errors about missing files!

i guess this option exists only in clockworkmod recovery?
im using amonra, so do not know about that

there is in amonra recovery too.......

I like to freeze apps with Titanium Backup. Works like a charm.

but you have to have donation version for that
verification in amonra recovery - how is it looks like there? I've just checked again - found nothing...

@Vice83 and anyone else whose interested
How I removed stock apps using SDK
I've had my HTC Desire for 2 weeks (T-Mobile UK, Eclair 2.1)). I'm a newbie to all of this. I spent untold hours on forums and other Android sites, and managed to do Nandroid backup of my phone, and then successfully rooted it (using Unrevoked and a SLAX (Linux) bootable cd). It was really straight forward.
I then installed the AdamG/OpenDesire Sense Froyo v1.0c custom ROM
I then wanted to remove apps that I know I don't need and will never use. There are many online guides on how to do this but, maybe it was me being very dumb, but none of them seemed to work for me. After many more hours reading forums etc I found that all the guides I had read missed out KEY actions\information.
So I've put this together from all the things I've learned from the forums etc. I'd like to give credit \ thanks to all of those who contributed to Android sites, forums etc which provided me with all the info I needed.
!!!!THE FOLLOWING IS WHAT I DID TO REMOVE APPS FROM MY (rooted) T-MOBILE HTC DESIRE - IT WORKED FOR ME - BUT MAY NOT WORK FOR YOU CREATE A NANDROID BACKUP FIRST!!! AND USE AT YOUR OWN RISK!!!!!
I installed Java and the Android SDK on an old laptop as I don’t want Java on my main desktop \ laptop.
I then created an Android folder on my pc (C:\Android)
I then copied the following folders from the "android-sdk-windows" folder into it
· Tools
· USB_DRIVER***
· Market-Licensing
*** The default drivers didn't work on my pc\laptop (Win 7 Ultimate, 64bit) so I extracted the drivers contained in a adb_driver_htc.zip file was posted on the My HTC Desire site to the USB folder and successfully installed the driver(s).
With my phone switched on, and in Disk Drive mode, I connected it to my pc with the usb cable. If the phone drivers are not installed / found
· Go to Device Manager.
· Right click on the device that represents your phone.
· Select "update driver software".
· Select "browse my computer for driver software".
· Browse to the C:\Android\usb_driver folder (or to wherever our usb_drivers folder is located, and make sure the "include subfolders" box is ticked).
· Click Next etc to install driver(s).
To test that the drivers were installed and the phone recognised by my pc I
· Opened a command prompt window (Start-run-cmd) and typed the following (don’t include the text in the brackets).
· CD\ (enter\return).
· CD\Android\tools (enter\return).
· adb devices (this listed my phone as HT******SS Recovery).
To exit from adb type EXIT at the “#” prompt. This takes you back to C:\Android\tools directory. Type EXIT to close the command prompt window
Safely remove \ eject the phone from the pc and disconnect the usb
Switch off the phone, and re-start it in Recovery mode by
Holding down the "volume-down" button and pressing power button.
Use " volume-down " button to highlight Recovery.
Press POWER to reboot. Phone will start in Recovery mode i.e. green text on black background.
Still in Recovery mode, connect phone to Computer via the usb cable.
On the pc, open a command prompt window
Type CD\ and press enter\return
Type CD\Android\tools and press enter/return
Type adb shell and press enter/return
On the phone, use the trackball to highlight Partition Menu and press trackball to select.
Use the trackball to highlight Mount /system and press trackball to select. This bypasses the need for the following adb command: mount –o rw,remount /dev/block/mtdblock3 /system - a command which caused me no end of grief!!!
In the windows command prompt window, type cd /system/app
Type ls –a to get a listing of all the *.apk files in the /system/app directory.
To remove an app type rm appname.apk (where appname is the name of the app to be removed – this command is case sensitive so you must type the app name exactly as it appears in the /system/app directory)
I’ve removed the following apps with the above method without any ill effects, and they no longer appear in my Applications list, or in the system/app directory.
Plurk, FaceBook, Stocks (and com.htc.StockWidget.apk), Twitter, Quick Office and YouTube
From what I’ve read, its not advisable to remove any of the Google apk files due to dependencies etc. People have also reported problems after deleting News, PicoTts and Weather apk’s / widgets – so I’ve left these alone. I’ve not been able to find a definitive list of stock apps that are safe to remove
Anyhoo, I hope this proves useful.
Vybz

Hey guys, I checked my apps2sd and it seems to be working fine, here are the symlinks:
dalvik-cache -> /system/sd/dalvik-cache
app-private -> /system/sd/app-private
app -> /system/sd/app
However when checking the Settings page, "Internal phone memory" is still showing 115mb free, and it was 129mb free when I flashed the rom 2 hours ago. Why aren't the apps installing to the SD card as they should? Can someone plz help?
EDIT: Now it's 108mb after I installed another 2 apps. Whats going on?

adb backup and restore app data - no root

Don't think anyone else has posted this yet so here goes:
A Google employee called Rich Hyndman posted this on his Google+:
https://plus.google.com/115995639636688350464/posts/b9ejZegfw8p
With Android 4.0 you can backup and restore app data to a computer using adb with no root required. I just did this on my stock device because I wanted to unlock it and install the 4.0.2 update manually as no OTA notification had come my way. Unfortunately the backup part doesn't work on Windows yet but it does on Ubuntu and Mac OS.
Here are the steps I performed:
1.) Connected my Galaxy Nexus to my Ubuntu machine with the Android SDK already setup
2.) I ran "sudo adb backup -f 20111219.bak -all" (adb only works as root on my machine)
3.) This pops up a screen on the phone asking for an encryption password to use for the backup (this will be asked for when you restore). It might work with no password
4.) Once the backup has completed the adb command will exit. Keep the .bak file somewhere safe
5.) Backup everything on USB storage (I used my Windows machine for this as I have no idea how to get MTP working on Linux)
6.) Wipe your phone with a factory reset or fastboot oem unlock
7.) Once wiped boot normally and you will have to perform initial setup again (do this on Wifi as it takes a while to re-download all apps)
8.) Wait for all your apps to download (download notifications will stop)
9.) With your phone connected to your PC again run "adb restore 20111219.bak" (this works on Windows oddly)
10.) If you used a password in step 3 enter it on your phone here and tap the restore button.
11.) Wait for it to finish restoring.. done
I restored BEFORE applying the update manually as detailed here because I didn't know if backing up on Android version 4.0.1 could be restored to Android version 4.0.2.
This restored all my app and game data and even setup the folders and shortcuts on my home screen (but not widgets). However, it did not restore my SMS message and call history so it looks like at least some apps won't be included in backups - YMMV.

[ICS] [PSA] [HOW-TO] Full Desktop Backup (no root needed)

Looking through the menus in my ICS i've noticed the option to set "Desktop Backup Password" and thought to myself - "Well, How odd... Android does not have any desktop backup solution built in..."
It took some digging since there wasn't a lot of information online - but I ended up stumbling upon this page:
http://www.tested.com/news/feature/...-data-from-your-galaxy-nexusno-root-required/
As it turns out - Google created a mechanism in ICS to create full desktop backups for apps, data and even system apps, without the need to have the device rooted.
Keep in mind this only works on Ice Cream Sandwich... So don't ask me if this will work on GB based ROMS... It WON'T.
Make sure you have a recent version of ADB on your machine, go to the developer menu, set-up a password, and then use adb with the following syntax to create a backup of your system (taken directly from ADB's help):
Code:
adb backup [-f <file>] [-apk|-noapk] [-shared|-noshared] [-all] [-system|-nosystem] [<packages...>]
-f <file> (write an archive of the device's data to <file>. If no -f option is supplied then the data is written to "backup.ab" in the current directory.)
-apk|-noapk enable/disable backup of the .apks themselves in the archive; the default is noapk.)
-shared|-noshared (enable/disable backup of the device's shared storage / SD card contents; the default is noshared.)
-all (means to back up all installed applications. This will include SD-Card backup)
-system|-nosystem (toggles whether -all automatically includes system applications; the default is to include system apps)
<packages...> (is the list of applications to be backed up. If the -all or -shared flags are passed, then the package list is optional. Applications explicitly g
iven on the command line will be included even if -nosystem would ordinarily cause them to be omitted.)
I hope this proves helpful to some of you...

This is awesome i had been wondering if google was going to release a backup tool
Thanks man

Don't have adb yet but I will after reading this, great find.
Sent from my SPH-D710 using XDA

Do you know how you would go about restoring the backup once its created?

apeironer said:
Do you know how you would go about restoring the backup once its created?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
you would also use adb to restore...
syntax:
adb restore <file>
where <file> is, of course, the name of the backup file...

adb requires root, however
This looks like a neat idea, however installing adb itself, requires root, making this somewhat moot.
Does anyone know of an app or method to do a full Android backup to desktop (Mac, Linux or if necessary Windows) which does not require root in any way, so I can completely factory-wipe my carrier-provided Galaxy Note II and restore it, and be back up in running in minutes?

desrod said:
This looks like a neat idea, however installing adb itself, requires root, making this somewhat moot.
Does anyone know of an app or method to do a full Android backup to desktop (Mac, Linux or if necessary Windows) which does not require root in any way, so I can completely factory-wipe my carrier-provided Galaxy Note II and restore it, and be back up in running in minutes?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ADB does NOT require root.
You are limited to the things you can do with ADB when then phone is not rooted - you will not be able to work with the system folders, but you should still be able to create the backup.
Just make sure you go to Settings > Developers Settings, and enable Android Debugging.
Let me know if it works.

Exactly what I was looking for.
Thank You!

for noobs
Just enable developer options, enable USB debug mode, create a desktop full backup password, revoke USB debug authorizations, install ADB on your PC (link below), open CMD and cd to the folder and run "adb start-server" then "adb backup -all"... it will create a backup file in that folder (mine was 200MB) called backup.ab.
https://developer.android.com/studio/releases/platform-tools.html

Anyone using this in 2023? What are the downsides, how does it compare to Google Cloud Backups?
EDIT: okay, that explains why it's not mentioned anymore
% adb backup -all
WARNING: adb backup is deprecated and may be removed in a future release
Now unlock your device and confirm the backup operation...
EDIT2: my backup is only 7MB... doesn't seem right? What's in there?

ADB backup not working?

OK so when I type in adb backup -f C\Backups\gnexbackup.ab -all -nosystem
it looks like it does it's thing and backs up everything, but then when I go to the folder (Backups) I don't see that .ab file... what's up?
I am using takju 4.1.1 unlocked bootloader, but no root

same problem

works, but does not fix broken system apps
start cmd with admin
go to location of adb.exe
C:\>cd C:\adb
check adb
C:\adb>adb devices
List of devices attached
0123456789ABCDEF device
connect only one device!
if "adb devices" returns anything else, something is wrong, try '>adb kill-server' and retry and/or redownload newest adb at thanks Snoop05
C:\adb>adb backup -all
confirm at phone with password, no password leads to failure during restoring process, its a known bug (adb v1.0.32 and below)
file C:\backup.ab will be created
restore with
C:\adb>adb restore backup.ab
confirm at phone with password
wait till done
works for me, all user apps and data are restored, but it did not fix my broken google services and deleted calendar storage (accidents happen )
This function is not reliable. Some apps work, others dont. Only use this if you dont have any other options, e.g. broken phone or some malfunction.

ADB Backup and Restore Issues

I'm trying to use ADB Backup and Restore, but when I try it I receive " Now unlock your device and confirm the backup operation."...however, nothing shows on the screen. Normally, a confirmation window displays on my phone, but nothing on the firestick.
I've tried single and double quotes, but nothing:
adb backup appname.ab -f com.app.com
adb backup 'appname.ab -f com.app.com'
adb backup "appname.ab -f com.app.com"
I'm trying to backup some app data and add it to another firestick, but running into some trouble. It isn't Kodi, but it is from a sideloaded app if that helps with more information.
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated! Thanks