How to back up specific folders on Android

📱 Desktop & mobile clients 🤖 Android
1

Solving this problem on a desktop is easy with the client. It is a tad sloppy IMHO, but it works. However, I can not seem to figure out how to do this under Android. I looked through the threads and I have found others requesting this capability on the [upstream oc] client, but have not found a solution. I am hoping maybe someone here knows how.

So I have an Android device and I have the NextCloud client. It all syncs great out of the path /storage/emulated/0/nextcloud/me@my.host/ . Awesome.

However, App1 is an app that I use daily. It has an auto backup feature, however, I do not have a choice in where it backs up its files. It will only store the files in /storage/emulated/0/app1/backups/app1.db

When I remember to copy it over to nextcloud, it always reads it in as a new file. So my nextcloud has a bunch of renamed-with-a-number-so-as-to-not-colide files. Blech.

The thing is, if it was just one app I would probably just deal with it. But I have 2 apps that I work with on a daily basis that I can not control the backup location and another 5 apps that I use weekly that I can not control the backup location. None of them sync to cloud storage that is under my control (eg: NextCloud).

I do have a weekly app that I can control the backup location and that doesn’t even help because the NextCloud app doesn’t seem to pick up the new files unless I import them from the client itself.

Under the Linux Desktop client, I just have a bunch of different “servers” specified in the client that all point to the same NextCloud server but different paths so that it will backup anything put into those folders. Also, a few of the applications are OK with me specifying a location of the main NextCloud client location and a few more are OK with me just doing a symlink between their location and the NextCloud client location. Symlinks for the Android apps didn’t work for the few apps I tried.

How do people back up all of their app data to NextCloud? Do they just sync it manually or is there something I am missing? Thoughts?

Thanks!

2

I think at the moment, it’s really just manual uploads, other than for photos / videos. There is discussion about being able to specify specific files/folders to keep synced, but it hasn’t been implemented yet.

3

Thanks for responding!

I am unable to find a discussion about specifying folders on the forum. Is that conversation on a mailing list? I would love to add a “me too!” to the official feature request (if there is one).

4

Sorry for the confusion. It wasn’t on the forum, but on the ownCloud project on GitHub before the fork. Still, the same people involved in that discussion are currently in Nextcloud if I remember correctly.

I did manage to find the issue where this is being worked on currently, though, so I’m sure you can always go an add a heart to this issue (devs tend to prefer this than a million “Me too!” messages cluttering up their inbox):

5

Thanks a lot! I will add a heart to that request. I appreciate your help on this!

1 Like
6

Happy to help. I’d really like to see this feature myself! :wink: Andy seems to be working hard on the client though, and dev speed seems good, so I’m hopeful. :smiley:

7

Well, in the meantime you can use an app like FolderSync to synchronize several folders between Android and Nextcloud. FolderSync supports ownCloud (Nextcloud) or simply WebDAV. I am syncing 6 folders and it is working like a charm. :slight_smile:

8

Glad it’s working for you. It would be nice to have a free option (as in speech and beer). Hopefully the Nextcloud client will become that option soon…

9

I know it’s been a year, but there’s a test support for custom folders here:

Cheers,
Mario

10

Ugh @mario necropost much!