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How do I sync Titanium Backup with Dropbox?

A.Nonymous

Extreme Android User
Jun 7, 2010
7,058
970
I'm trying to figure this out. I bought Titanium Backup today just because one of the features it offered was syncing with Dropbox. It says it's an experimental feature which I take to mean buggy as hell, but I'm willing to try it out. I can't figure out how to set it up though. I've dug through all the settings and it's possible I'm missing something completely, but I don't know where. Can anyone walk me through how to do this? Being able to sync my backups to the cloud is a huge thing for me.
 
While their website says it's in there, I too can't figure out how to accomplish this.

I am going to try this though...
I'm going into preferences and I'm going to set the "Backup folder name" to "dropbox/Titaniumbackup" and see if that doesn't just place your backup files in the dropbox directory on your sdcard.

I'll report back.

I tried that when I was messing with it. It didn't work. Apparently dropbox doesn't sync both ways with their Android app.
 
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Apparently there's a new build that just popped on the market that does have Dropbox under Menu >> Preferences. I can't get it to work though. It won't let me log in. Is it just me or are other people having this same problem? If you don't have a Dropbox account and want to test this out, the official referral thread is here. (I don't want to get in trouble for pimping out my own account.) If this works, it lets you sync your backups to the cloud so you can rebuild your phone from scratch virtually anywhere. I'd love to know if anyone can get it to work.
 
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I ran a full backup before hand and ended up uploading over 180 mb of data. It took at least 40 mins and was at the 50-60% range when I fell asleep. I woke up and it had finished. I had it run a backup of some new apps over night so I told it to sync again. This time it finished in the time it took me to take a shower. The first sync probably takes the longest. After that, it only has to sync the files that changed. I would not recommend syncing over 3G unless you really desire to have your phone sync for several hours.

I'm going to play with it tonight and see how useful this is if I completely toast my phone. How easy is it to get your backup off the cloud and put it to use?
 
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I ran a full backup before hand and ended up uploading over 180 mb of data. It took at least 40 mins and was at the 50-60% range when I fell asleep. I woke up and it had finished. I had it run a backup of some new apps over night so I told it to sync again. This time it finished in the time it took me to take a shower. The first sync probably takes the longest. After that, it only has to sync the files that changed. I would not recommend syncing over 3G unless you really desire to have your phone sync for several hours.

I'm going to play with it tonight and see how useful this is if I completely toast my phone. How easy is it to get your backup off the cloud and put it to use?

I would expect it's as simple as installing Titanium Backup on your phone and downloading the files. It would take some time no doubt. I'll keep a backup on my home PC and use Dropbox as a last resort.
 
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I would expect it's as simple as installing Titanium Backup on your phone and downloading the files. It would take some time no doubt. I'll keep a backup on my home PC and use Dropbox as a last resort.

Yeah, that's what I expect too, but I like to play with scenarios like this just in case. My plan is to fully back up the SD card and get a nandroid backup of everything else. Then I'm going to test out an autonuking program I've got to see how well it works and go from there.
 
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Sounds good. Keep us posted on how things go.

I just tried it out. I got a nandroid backup of my phone. Then I wiped the phone and the SD card so I'm basically simulating having a brand new phone. I installed Titanium, got my license off GMail and pressed the "Sync to Dropbox" button. It went out and deleted all my backup files off Dropbox. Obviously, this is useless.

I tried installing the Dropbox client to my phone thinking I could then go sync the entire phone and do a restore that way. Sadly, Dropbox only lets you sync files from Dropbox one at a time. This is not a realistic way to do a restore from backup. Maybe in an absolutely worst case scenario I could do a restore that way, but not a way I would choose to do a restore. I'd be better off downloading a Nandroid backup from Dropbox and restoring that way. Oh well, it is an experimental feature. I'm sure they'll iron the bugs out of it.
 
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I just tried it out. I got a nandroid backup of my phone. Then I wiped the phone and the SD card so I'm basically simulating having a brand new phone. I installed Titanium, got my license off GMail and pressed the "Sync to Dropbox" button. It went out and deleted all my backup files off Dropbox. Obviously, this is useless.

I tried installing the Dropbox client to my phone thinking I could then go sync the entire phone and do a restore that way. Sadly, Dropbox only lets you sync files from Dropbox one at a time. This is not a realistic way to do a restore from backup. Maybe in an absolutely worst case scenario I could do a restore that way, but not a way I would choose to do a restore. I'd be better off downloading a Nandroid backup from Dropbox and restoring that way. Oh well, it is an experimental feature. I'm sure they'll iron the bugs out of it.

Dang...that was really rude of Titanium to axe the files in Dropbox. Sounds like it needs a bit of work. The nandroid backup sounds much more viable obviously.

Nevertheless, kudos to you for having the intestinal fortitude to try it out, and thanks for the report! :)
 
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Dang...that was really rude of Titanium to axe the files in Dropbox. Sounds like it needs a bit of work. The nandroid backup sounds much more viable obviously.

Nevertheless, kudos to you for having the intestinal fortitude to try it out, and thanks for the report! :)

I had nothing to lose and a Phillies game to watch. Not that hard to backup your phone completely when you know for sure that you're going to wipe it out. And the Phillies clinched the NL East so it all worked out.
 
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If anyone still needs to know how to get Titanium talking to Dropbox, my husband says he's got that working smoothly.

Alas, I'm afraid I can't be of much help. I didn't have any problems getting it to work. I just installed Titanium Backup Pro, set things in what seemed the obvious way, and it worked. I didn't encounter any of the problems that others are encountering, so I would't have any experience at solving them.
 
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Open Titanium Backup, Backup/Restore, Menu, Preferences, and check Enable Dropbox. Then tap on Dropbox Settings, Remote Location, and set the folder on Dropbox you want to sync to. I set a new folder named TitaniumBackup, to keep it all in one easy-to-find place. Then set the labels to synchronize - I chose Synchronize Everything. Set the number of backups to keep, then okay out. That's all you should need to do.
 
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