All SMS lost? Possible solution explained

[pyrho]

Yesterday I was sending an SMS, then i received a phone call. And since then all my SMS are gone from my iphone.
After searching the net i found a way to get them all back !
BUT if you sync'd your iPhone since then, then there's no way to get them back, in the other case here is the solution:

Itunes backs up your iphone each time you sync it, these backups are stored in *.mdbackup files. On MAC OS they are located on "~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup", on Windows it's in "CDocuments And Settings\$USERNAME\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup".
In these folders you must have other folders with strange names, open the most recent.
Then you must get a copy of this script:

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

# This file clumsily extracts the DB's hidden in the iPhone backup files
# Usage: perl -w bkupextract.pl /Users/flip/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/*/*

my %seen;
foreach my  (@ARGV) {
    
    # Slurp File Contents
    open(FILE, "<") or die "Can't open : $!";
    my  = do {local $/; binmode FILE; <FILE>};
    close(FILE);

    # skip non-SQLite Files
    ( =~ m|SQLite|) or next;

    # identify the file and use it to name the output
    my  = ( =~ m!([^/]*?).(sqlitedb|db)!) ? $1 : 'unknown';
    ++;
    my  = sprintf "%s_%02d.db", , ;
    # Helpful progress report
    printf STDERR "%-60s to %-25sn", , , ;

    # dump the part between "SQLite format 3" and end
    # FIXME -- is there cruft at end?  I don't know the SQLite format.  Maybe you do?
    open(OUTFILE, ">") or die "Can't open : $!";
    binmode OUTFILE; 
    my  = ;
     =~ s/^(.*?SQLite format 3)/SQLite format 3/;
    print OUTFILE ;
    close(OUTFILE);

}

Put this code in the file lolrus.perl.

Then run it like this: perl lolrus.perl *.mdbackup (You must run it in the folder where the *.mdbackup's are).

This script will extract *.db files from the backups, and you should probably see a sms.db file (or sms_01.db or something like that).

Once you have this file, copy it on you iPhone at this place: "/var/mobile/Library/SMS/". The filename must be "sms.db". /var/mobile is for 1.1.3 and onwards. If you have 1.1.2 or ealier versions it should be "/var/root/Library/SMS". Another thing, I created links in my filesystem to have more space for Applications and ****, so on my iPhone the path is "/private/var/mobile/Library/SMS", it depends. But in all cases if you can't locate this folder, just run 'find / -name "sms.db"' from a terminal (through ssh or from the iPhone's terminal) and see where that ******* file is .

That's it you're all set ! And welcome back SMS's!
If there are un-clear points or if some of you are having troubles doing one of the things above, just post a reply and I'll try to help !

Hope this helps !

Sources: TUAW[http://www.tuaw.com/2007/08/22/howto...s-from-a-mac/], and more generally google.

[koolksmart]

Where are the backups stored for XP?

[soulrx]

Where are the backups stored for XP?

CDocuments and Settings\*XP-Username*\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup\sha1hash?

So I found the mdbackups, but how do I extract them to a text file or csv or database? I have found nothing for Windows XP - would that Perl script work in windows environemnt? Could I copy the mdbackup files to a linux machine and execute that perl script?