SimpleMobileTools
Export messages doesn't export all messages, but exports invalid JSON
While trying to migrate my messages to a new device using Simple SMS Messenger, I received an error saying invalid json while importing on the new device. Sure enough, opening the json in vim and going to the end of the file shows the json isn't completed. Here is metadata about the JSON (wc is a command that print newline, word, and byte counts for each file):
~/storage/shared $ wc Messages_2022_01_28_05_11_25.json
0 61140 44868119 Messages_2022_01_28_05_11_25.json
Yup Android file manager reports it at 42.79 MB. It's strange- doesn't seem to be a problem with available RAM or storage and it's not random-
69cc96e40bc9abf021c0fd4db67ccf04 Messages_2022_01_28_05_11_25.json
69cc96e40bc9abf021c0fd4db67ccf04 Messages_2022_01_28_11_33_44.json
When the process completes, there's a quite unfortunate message shown in a toast saying "Export Successful"
Having the same issue- lost my message history. Oh well. File is 44,745,005 bytes, it mostly looks like image data inside.
@MrAce100 did you keep the old device and messages? I ended up using a different app just for the import/export: https://github.com/tmo1/sms-ie (On F-Droid). Simple SMS at least recognized the changes this other app made.
This should be a critical bug to fix since it will eventually lead to loss of user's personal data (some people keep messages from people they can no longer talk with). The long term solution would be to check that the newly created JSON is actually valid before displaying Export Successful. Short term would be to label the SMS import/export feature experimental and recommend a dedicated app like the one I linked to above.
@MrAce100 did you keep the old device and messages?
No, I was moving my current phone over to a different ROM, so my messages are gone forever unfortunately. On the bright side, I didn't lose any critical data, so it's more of an annoyance than anything.