yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Google Pixel 5a] J.Michael:
I think tar always records timestamps. When you un-tar there is an option to ignore the saved timestamps. I think the default is to restore them.

tar does not compress. At least, not by default.

You saw the numbers. You are using more than half. Unless it compresses enough, it won't fit. If you have mostly image files and audio/video, it won't compress much.

This all started with you being disappointed that adb get didn't preserve timestamps. Why would you think adb put would do any different?

If it is such a burden to move the big tar file to the new phone, you could make smaller tar files. Or you could think now about what on the old phone is crap, and what is worth saving. For instance, the Android directory in internal storage isn't really yours. Maybe it would be better to not transfer it to the new phone.

The "du" command gives the disk space used by files and directories.

cd /sdcard
du -sh *

will give you the size of each top-level directory in internal storage. See if excluding Android gets you under 50 GB.

That post you linked indicates that adb get has trouble with large files. Maybe it would be better to make smaller tar files. (Although with 60 GB in play, "smaller" is relative.)

cd sdcard
tar cf music.tar music

It may be that 7zip will do a wonderful job examining / manipulating a tar file on a Windows PC, but I would advise working in a Linux environment. Specifically, I would advise booting into Linux. A LiveUSB might be good enough. A LiveUSB with persistence would almost certainly be good enough. I have no experience with the Linux-under-Windows environment.
[Google Pixel 5a] SideSkroll:
The android directory contains the whatsapp folder. which is one of the reasons for me to try to do this. (I have no drive backup cause I stopped using whatsapp for the past 8 months. And google deletes files all willy nilly...)

I would THINK that only DCIM and whatsapp need to preserve the timestamps, right? So I'd like to start out with the whatsapp folder.

To be more precise, this is the path:

barbet:/sdcard/android/media/com.whatsapp $

Could you give me the exact instructions to get that file compressed and MOVED to my pc so I can try it by myself on the others I might need to do?

Or better yet, how do I EXCLUDE certain folders from the tar file? I know for a fact that folders like screenshots, download etc dont need their timestamps preserved so I can very easily pull them like usual.

Also, do I run the commands in adb shell?

I would appreciate it very much.

Otherwise if "cutting" is not possible, how would I delete it after the transfer is completed?

Thanks for all your help.
[Google Pixel 5a] J.Michael:
You are equating "compress" with "preserve timestamps". They are separate. "tar" bundles files into a single file. There is no compression. There is, however, a recording of timestamps. The default operation is to restore timestamps when extracting from an archive.

I think it is only you who would be unhappy if timestamps are lost. I don't know what databases you have, but I doubt that the database file timestamps have any effect on the data contained. JPEG files are likelyvto contain metadata specifying when the picture was taken -- this is completely separate from the times recorded for the file in the filesystem.

That said, I understand wanting the filesystem times to be preserved after moving files to the new phone. I think that is best done by moving a tar file to the new phone and extracting there.

This "cut" function is an artefact of a particular GUI. It is not available to you. You *are* free to delete a file on the old phone once you think you don't need it there. I think you should wait until you actually *need* to free space before you worry about it.
[Google Pixel 5a] SideSkroll:
For instance, if I push the photos from the old phone to the new one they would ALL appear as taken today, instead of how google photos have them archived.

Maybe I have no idea as to what I'm talking about. I'm way more of a noob in this than I would like to admit but through observation Ive noticed that a photo take say, december of last year shows up in the reel as taken the day it was copied.

Please if Im talking out of my ass do let me know! Id appreciate it. All Im trying to accomplish with this is 2 things: Keep the photos with their respective days as they are and 2 avoid the errors that usually popup by pulling a lot of files from android to a pc. (name scheme errors etc)

EDIT: Wait! I think Ive got it!

using this:

adb exec-out "tar -ch sdcard/foroot | gzip -1" > "D:\SD\sdcard_Android.tar.gz"

I was able to get a compressed file. On my PC preserving the timestamps intact (test folder)

Now I have 2 questions (which are hopefully my last 2 ones)

1) Does this command create the tar file "on the fly (meaning it doesnt occupy space on the phone)

2) Do I need to push the tar file to my phone compressed to preserve the timestamps?
[Google Pixel 5a] Nergal di Cuthah:
The netadata should do that, as said above, the file create date is only inserted in files without that meta and you can change it easily in gphotos if the date wasn't there (example: i can download a picture of my dog as a puppy from facebook; as facebook has removed meta it shows todays date and i edit it to the date of the facebook post). If the data is there it should keep the original meta date.

This is my understanding and experience but that may be due to having (not always using) gphotos that gives the right date to pictures I've downloaded to my (later than the pictures) phone.
[Google Pixel 5a] J.Michael:
Again, I have not been talking about compression. It might be as easy as adding a "z" option to the "tar" command, but I have not been talking about it.

I have been assuming that doing anything on the phone involved adb shell. If you have been using something else to run the commands, please explain.

tar --help
cd /sdcard
du -sh Android/media/com.whatsapp
tar cf whatsapp.tar Android/media/com.whatsapp
ls -l whatsapp.tar

If the "du" command reports that the Whatsapp directory is morevthan 50 GB, we can talk about compression. (If the "tar" Help describes an option to compress, you can just add that letter to the lost on the tar command:

tar czf whatsapp.tar Android/media/com.whatsapp

If you build a tar file, try transferring it to your PC.

If you're convinced you successfully transferred a file to your PC, you are free to delete the original from the phone. Again in adb shell, the command is "rm filename".

(I would run "md5sum" at both ends. I assume you have one on your phone -- you'll find out when you type "md5sum filename". I have one on my Windows PC courtesy of the people who put together a bundle with a name like UNXUTILS.ZIP. Google it. I think I got my copy from Sourceforge. (Also an update with a name like UPDUTILS.ZIP))

Is your new phone rooted? I've been reading how people with newer versions of Android have trouble playing with the Android folder in internal storage.

Ane there is no guarantee that copying a directory is going to accomplish what you want. Maybe Whatsapp doesn't just use whatever is in that directory. Maybe it has to be put there by Whatsapp, with a corresponding entry in a private database. You have never said what it is that you think you are preserving.

Anyway, let us know the size of the directory, the size of the tar file, whether you used compression, whether you got the file transferred, whether you are happy with the results. Somebody is always here.
[Google Pixel 5a] J.Michael:
I don't know "exec-out", but from the way you use Windows syntax after the redirect I'd say no file was created on the phone. Which also means you have no way to test for corruption in transit. (Unless the gzip process, which occurred on the phone, provides error detection.)

You are still not keeping "archive" and "compress" separate. The tar file contains timestamps. You compressed the tar file. You will unco,press the tar file before you extract files from the tar file. The only difference between pushing the compressed file to the phone, where you uncompress and extract, and uncompressing so you can push an uncompressed file, which you then extract, is how much data gets transferred, and how much work is done on the phone.

You still haven't said: how big is the folder on the old phone; how big is the compressed tar file?

What is "foroot"?
[Google Pixel 5a] beeshyams:
Do the posts on the last couple of pages belong here?

If the person having this problem opens a new thread and the helpful folks (thanks to them) answer it there, it would be searcheable and useful for other XDA visitors besides decluttering this thread
[Google Pixel 5a] SideSkroll:
Yes. What I mean by "compression" is actually "archive" my bad.

The whatsapp folder accounts for 22GB of the total.

Like I mentioned before, I have no backup in drive for whatsapp. So the only way to get the files back would be to push the whatsapp folder (containing media and databases folders) and hope that whatsapp pipcks it up and populates itself with the contents in it (which used to be the case back in the day, when the whatsapp folder lived in the sdcard root folder.

Im HOPING it still works like that otherwise theres nothing more I can do to get it back.

My phone is rooted, yes.

I'm still trying to get this done. And Ive succeed with several test folders and files. But when I tried piping the whole SDCARD folder to my pc at some point an error mustve ocurred cause teh resulting tar archive has a CRC error. And cant be opened.

"foroot" is simply a random test folder created for the sole purpose of testing all of this. :D
[Google Pixel 5a] SideSkroll:
Yes please. I apologize for taking over this thread. It wasnt my intention.

If a mod could please take my messages and move them to a separate thread?... It could help somebody else in a similar situation as me.
[Google Pixel 5a] shadowstep:
This is done. All the posts are in this new thread. :)

Regards,

shadowstep

Senior Moderator
[Google Pixel 5a] J.Michael:
Did you try making a tar of just the Whatsapp folder?

If you used compression, how big was the tar file?

Did you try moving the tar of the Whatsapp folder to your PC? Do you get an error?

Do you have a Linux environment on your PC? What kind of environment?
[Google Pixel 5a] badabing2003:
Like others had said, photos taken on your phone would have the metadata in the photo and the file timestamp should not matter one bit.

You can pull the dcim directory without fear and the metadata would be preserved.

I didn't think db dates ever matter unless some app is written in a very lousy way to check the file timestamp.

Your wasting a lot of time back and forth, try it out and see.

Don't look at file timestamps, look at the exif data.

If you have storage space, tar cvfz would help because transfer of small files are slow whereas one large file is mush faster.

If you don't have storage space, and you still insist on preserving file timestamps, write a script that lists, tars, transfers, deletes one file at a time in a loop.
[Google Pixel 5a] SideSkroll:
Hi guys. Im happy to report that everything seems to be working fine now. In the end I just piped the folders one by one (exec-out tar/gzip) to my PC.

Whatsapp picked up the backups (and media) correctly. And even the photos app "recognized" the correct timestamps of each photo.

The problem with only caring about the exif data is that not every image has it embedded (for example, shared images or downloaded ones) and google photos DOES ARRANGE the images by their last modified date (Ive tested this with MANY photos before commiting to push the whole folder.

So for instance, a photo taken back in march of 2020 would appear in my reel as taken the day it was pushed to the phone.

That was the WHOOOOLE tar/archived drama.

And Im happy I did it the "hard way". Cause archived folderskept the last modified date while just pulling the files changed it.

By the way, in case anybody reading this wonders, PUSHING the folders by themselves (with no tar) didnt change anything.

So its the offloading that does it.

So yeah, everything seems to be working as intended and now I'm free to to try whatever with the damn 5a that I had lying around for the past 8 months without the fear to lose ita contents forever.

Now I just need to figure out the way to spoof the photos app to get pixel 1's unlimited storage (the new whatsapp backup ate the whole drive space)

If someone could point me to the proper thread (I think pixelify does this... But it doesnt work with Android 14? Am I right?) I would really appreciate it.

Anyway, guys. I can't tell you how much I appreciate all of your help.

And to anyone reading this: remember, ALWAYS wether youre rooted or not ALWAYS keep your adb active. USB debugging was thw ONLY THING that allowed me to get my stuff back.

Thanks again to everyone!
[Google Pixel 5a] SideSkroll:
Thank you 👍👍
[Google Pixel 5a] J.Michael:
How big was the Whatsapp tar file?

What do you mean "PUSHING the folders by themselves (with no tar) didnt change anything"?
[Google Pixel 5a] SideSkroll:
About the same size as the non archived/compressed folder. Maybe a couple hundreds megs lighter. I didn't md5sum any filea before or after (mainly because I piped them directly) but the fact that 7zip didnt show any errors and that the database was recognized should be indicative of no corruption, right?

What I mean is that I was able to un-archive the folders, edit random trash files out and push them as FOLDERS to the phone and there was no change to the metadata. Opposite to pulling them. Which did change it. (Unless of course they were in tar files)

So basically to keep the metadata intact you have to pull them as tar but you can push them however you like, file by file, full folders etc.

I'm not sure if theres a way to preserve the CREATED date though but android doesnt seem to care about that date, only last modified. So AFAIK everythings fine...
[Google Pixel 5a] J.Michael:
ZIP archive might preserve creation date. (That's "zip" and "unzip", *not* "gzip".)

Android doesn't care about any date. UNIX filesystems don't have a "creation" date.

That *is* interesting that "adb push" conveys timestamps.

On the new phone, you could use Windows Explorer to move files to or from your PC. At least sometimes it preserves timestamps.

Yet another option for you on the new phone would be ftp. I think when it's working right it preserves timestamps.
[Google Pixel 5a] SideSkroll:
Yeah, Ill be more careful this time.

Gonna try and make AT LEAST bi-montly backups (using the same technique I used to extract the data from the old phone)

To be honest that was the FIRST PHONE that has ever failed me. EVER. Leave it to Google to make such a crappy device (and leave it to me to go ahead and buy their newest midranger the 8a. Im a glutton for punishment it seems.)

In my experience at least, MTP on windows does change the timestamps. Even pulling the files through ADB on Windows does (that was the whole point of this little oddisey of mine)

not that it matters anymore cause the proof is in the pudding. And the DCMIN folder synchonized flawlessly with the google photos backup (instead of treating the original images as different files) Thats what I was trying to accomplish.

Let me ask you something, not directly related to this thread but it would give me peace of mind.

Like I said, I have the 8a now.

And before rooting it I went ahead and updated it through the AFT website.

Before, with my 5a there were no "different choices" to pick from. Now, there are Japanese firmwares (obviously not my case) verizon, at&t and a couple more.

My phone was purchased from Google (well, their Amazon store since I cared more for that gift card than Googles own). So I picked "DEFAULT" as my choice of firmware.

Now here is the "weird part" I could swear that the firmware ON THE PHONE before updating it was this one:

14.0.0 (UD2A.231203.057.A1, May 2024, Verizon, gStore, CA, USC)

I DISTINCTLY remember the .057.A1 at the end....

Though it would make no sense since the phone is "unlocked"

Anyway, the firmware I downlaoded (and am currently running) is:

14.0.0 (UD2A.240505.001.W1, May 2024)

Im pretty sure I picked the right one (cause it works.) but would appreciate a second opinion if its not much trouble.

Thanks for all your help. You and everybody else.
[Google Pixel 5a] J.Michael:
I am no longer sure what MTP is. I cannot find any mention of it in Android Settings. I expected to find a place where I would choose whether connecting to PC via USB would use MTP, PTP, or something else. The closest I come is a Developer Option "Default USB configuration" that chooses among "Transferring files", "MIDI", "Transferring images", and "Charging tablet only". I am using "Transferring files".

I routinely copy files over USB cable between PC and tablet using Windows Explorer. Every so often I see a file whose timestamp is different but whose contents are identical. At that point, I pay close attention when copying, and when I am paying attention, the timestamps are always preserved.

I also used Windows Explorer to copy my 3 GB firmware file back and forth and, according to the md5sum at either end, never experienced the "corruption" warned about.

Maybe if you change to something other than MTP it will behave more to your liking.

I do not know what the AFT web site is, or how to interpret the version strings. Look for a Pixel thread. Don't expect someone who knows to stumble across this thread.
[Google Pixel 5a] eqroiueq:
I found this thread after the drama was over. I'm just curious whether the firmware you were using during the problem on your 5a allowed you to connect an external monitor via a USB-C to DisplayPort cable without changing any settings. That's how I eventually unlocked the screen, enabled adb, etc. to get the data off my OnePlus 7TProNR running LineageOS after I broke the screen by accidentally stepping on it.

For future adb shell action, try looking up Linux commands. Especially if you have busybox (a collection of Linux command line utilities) installed in Magisk/etc. before you start this can be helpful.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Aserar:
So installing Kernel SU (kernel image, not the app) recently causes the data partition's size to be incorrectly reported as 1TB through custom recovery. This means that nand backup doesn't work and results in a insufficient disk space error. Restoring the boot partition doesn't restore the correct size of the data partition.

Is there any way to fix this issue without losing data?
[General Questions and Answers] SomeoneAnoniRat:
Can anyone help me?

I wanna change my OS to Pixel, or Overclock my phone.

I don't make my Phone be Brick 😠

Anyways Thank you 😁

Btw my phone not Rooted

If you can't help me with that, can I make my phone look like literal IPhone? Or make my Lock screen looks better 😕
[OnePlus Pad] ChristinCao:
As the title says, I now own a oppo pad2 This device has exactly the same hardware as the OnePlus tablet, and now I want to change the system to oxygen OS who knows how I can do this？🥹🥹
[OnePlus Pad] modyanwar3:
I am looking for the same but didn't find any info yet. Appreciate if you can share with me once you get info
[OnePlus Pad] M.Mosa007:
It might be worth looking here in XDA's paid software forum.

OnePlus Auth Flash /Region UNLOCK /(Oneplus/OPPO/Realme) & all other services only 1+ (all in one)

This thread is Authorised for posting by the site administration. XDA plays no role in providing this service other than permitting this post. XDA receives no benefit financial or otherwise and has not tested or approved any of the services...

xdaforums.com
[OnePlus 9 Pro] AKZADRAN:
Hello engineers! So I've just converted my OnePlus 9 pro T-Mobile LE2127 to EU firmware with MSM tool from stock TMO oxygen 11 to EU oxygen 11. I've followed the conversion guide that's already famous in xda for oneplus 9 pro T-Mobile but IDK why I have no signals now.

Note: My phone was already sim unlocked before converting when It was on stock TMO firmware. Please help
[OnePlus 9 Pro] Zxalilh:
Could you convert back to check if it works? Did you check for any hardware differences, such as different bands supported by the modems?
[OnePlus 9 Pro] AKZADRAN:
Yes I've converted it back but now it's network locked. IDK why this happened
[OnePlus 9 Pro] AKZADRAN:
Yes I've converted it back but now it's network locked. IDK why this happe
[OnePlus 9 Pro] Zxalilh:
Do you get any signal as of now?
[OnePlus 9 Pro] AKZADRAN:
Nope, no signal coz it got carrier locked to T-mobile but I have backup of complete msm readback partitions at the time when my carrier was unlocked on tmo firmware. Can those backups save me?
[OnePlus 9 Pro] Appreciative:
See about booting into fastboot or fastbootd and allowing flashing of critical partitions? Then try to send them back into the phone maybe. What does it say when you try to flash modemst1/2 back in like you do non-hlos?

Other options might be the Qualcomm toolset or using bkerlers EDL toolkit from GitHub but I'm not sure if those tools will allow you to write any partition or only read. I had trouble trying to write partitions but I can't remember why or if that was on the 7TP5G or the 9P. I do remember that it was extremely picky about the environment used. My laptop wouldn't work with my USB ports, I had to find an older laptop with usb2 ports, despite my usb2 cable changes, it was problematic. I eventually used the ISO to boot it on an older laptop and it worked but I can't remember if I wrote or only read
[OnePlus 9 Pro] AKZADRAN:
Thanks

Thanks

Thanks for replying, I've flashed those modemst1 and 2 countless times but it don't do anything. Still carrier locked after flashing modemst1 and 2 but when I flash non-hlos, it flashes only modem_a then it stops and then when I reboot the phone it goes into crash dump mode.
[OnePlus 9 Pro] TheGhost1951:
who is the carrier/sim card from? And I take it you had TMO firmware installed to begin with
[OnePlus 9 Pro] TheGhost1951:
Have you tried to remove sim card and msm back to TMO then re-installing sim card?
[OnePlus 9 Pro] Appreciative:
How are you flashing non-hlos? If your "original" modemst1/2 was unlocked, it should be unlocked still. That makes me think maybe someone did some type of fckery with the sim or imei to appear unlocked and work fine until you msm'd and it went back to "real original". If you flash back to stock Tmo and use wifi (perhaps USA VPN if you're not in the US) can you access the built in unlocker app to get a regular attempt from T-Mobile servers to unlock?
[OnePlus 9 Pro] AKZADRAN:
I flashed non-hlos while in bootloader with command, "fastboot flash modem non-hlos.bin" that cause crash dump. Maybe I'm using wrong command?

And yes it was unlocked before and I flash modemst1 and 2 with the command "fastboot flash modemst1 modemst1.bin". But nothing changes.

And the built-in unlock app give me this strange error, look at screenshot attached please.
[OnePlus 9 Pro] AKZADRAN:
Yes I have tried it but no luck
[OnePlus 9 Pro] TheGhost1951:
Who supplied the sim card and what carrier?
[OnePlus 9 Pro] TheGhost1951:
Device SIM Unlock phone - Apps on Google Play

Unlocking system for Phones, SIM unlock your mobile phone by app

play.google.com
[OnePlus 9 Pro] Appreciative:
I just quickly quoted a device. It was $120 to unlock. That's crazy 😂.

I am wondering if the device has a different IMEI than the modemst1/2 that was saved. Maybe they modified the IMEI and unlocked it but now it's not matching because it was msm'd? I wish there was better info about sim unlocking these devices. It's very hush hush and no good IMEI discussion on xda for legal reasons makes that even harder to troubleshoot these things.

If you were able to attempt an unlock like normal, I would try to help you by saying I bought the device and want to get it unlocked on my Tmo plan but that's not gonna work until you can figure out what's happening. Maybe someone with deeper knowledge of IMEI or modemst1/2 can help but I don't know who that is