iPhone: How to get rid of 3GBs of "other" data?

[Hf44]

Hello, before the anticipated 6.1 jailbreak, i would just like to clear all this "Other" Data from my 4S. Im on 6.1 not jailbroken obviously and it shows 3 GB of data in others. I used applications to delete temporary data from all my applications, but barely any luck.

After further investgation, i backed up my phone and with a program i fpund lots of color keyboard data, springboard themes, jailbreak data and etc.

How can i delete all this while keeping all my photos, contacts, SMS and most importantly app data?

Thank you

[dhlizard]

Originally Posted by Hf44

Hello, before the anticipated 6.1 jailbreak, i would just like to clear all this "Other" Data from my 4S. Im on 6.1 not jailbroken obviously and it shows 3 GB of data in others. I used applications to delete temporary data from all my applications, but barely any luck.

After further investgation, i backed up my phone and with a program i fpund lots of color keyboard data, springboard themes, jailbreak data and etc.

How can i delete all this while keeping all my photos, contacts, SMS and most importantly app data?

Thank you

Do a clean restore to stock 6.1
Do not restore to backup

That will shrink the other file to the smallest size possible

[BumpyFlatline]

Originally Posted by Hf44

Hello, before the anticipated 6.1 jailbreak, i would just like to clear all this "Other" Data from my 4S. Im on 6.1 not jailbroken obviously and it shows 3 GB of data in others. I used applications to delete temporary data from all my applications, but barely any luck.

After further investgation, i backed up my phone and with a program i fpund lots of color keyboard data, springboard themes, jailbreak data and etc.

How can i delete all this while keeping all my photos, contacts, SMS and most importantly app data?

Thank you

dhLizard is correct. In order to shrink that to its smallest size possible, you need to restore as new. I always restore as new because there are simple ways to backup everything so you won't lose a byte of data but also take advantage of the benefits of a "freshly jailbroken, restored as new to factory settings" device.

I use iCloud to backup my contacts, photos, app data, etc. There are several ways to backup SMS messages too but I never do that so I'm not sure what program you need. I bet numerous people here at MR know a program you could use though. If I were you, I would jailbreak 6.1 and then use AppBackup, PKGBackup or something similar to save all your important app data to you computer. Then you after you backup everything, you can restore as new, jailbreak, install all your apps, and then copy all the saved data back to the apps so they are exactly how they were before. Personally I use iCloud and AppBackup together because not all apps use iCloud to its potential. This way, I don't lose ANY game saves or app data.

[guitarmandp]

Also try deleting the attachments folder after you've jailbroken

[ncaissie]

This happens to me a lot. It is videos that are not registering proper. Just keep changing your videos and re-syncing. It usually takes 3-4 times.

[Hf44]

Originally Posted by BumpyFlatline

dhLizard is correct. In order to shrink that to its smallest size possible, you need to restore as new. I always restore as new because there are simple ways to backup everything so you won't lose a byte of data but also take advantage of the benefits of a "freshly jailbroken, restored as new to factory settings" device.

I use iCloud to backup my contacts, photos, app data, etc. There are several ways to backup SMS messages too but I never do that so I'm not sure what program you need. I bet numerous people here at MR know a program you could use though. If I were you, I would jailbreak 6.1 and then use AppBackup, PKGBackup or something similar to save all your important app data to you computer. Then you after you backup everything, you can restore as new, jailbreak, install all your apps, and then copy all the saved data back to the apps so they are exactly how they were before. Personally I use iCloud and AppBackup together because not all apps use iCloud to its potential. This way, I don't lose ANY game saves or app data.

I have tried icloud, but my data is 4 GB, and my other is 3GB so i cant do that, as my limit is 5 on icloud.

I guess ill try to restore as a brand new phone. I will use appbackup for my app data. For my contacts, sms, and pictures, any ideas? I would like to get my pictures back to my camera roll.



I have an application that browses backups. And lets me export data from one, and i can transger it to a back up with virtually nothing there. I just dont know which files exactly. Bad idea?

[bushido]

i always use iCleaner, its in Cydia

[jps1012]

Originally Posted by bushido

i always use iCleaner, its in Cydia

How does that work?

[bushido]

Originally Posted by jps1012

How does that work?

it gets rid of cache, unused old cydia tweak crap etc. i cant look right now as cydia does not load -.- i saved 1,3 GB last time i did it

[jps1012]

Originally Posted by bushido

it gets rid of cache, unused old cydia tweak crap etc. i cant look right now as cydia does not load -.- i saved 1,3 GB last time i did it

sweet I will check it out.

[Cvzjoka]

Does anyone else have a problem where they have 11gb of other data on their phone. I cannot do anything on my iphone because of the lack of space. I went to apple and they said they have no idea why this is happening. Ive tried everything please help. all i need are my messages to be backed up thats it.i can deal with losing everything else.
Thanks this is so stressful

[iaymnu]

Originally Posted by Cvzjoka

Does anyone else have a problem where they have 11gb of other data on their phone. I cannot do anything on my iphone because of the lack of space. I went to apple and they said they have no idea why this is happening. Ive tried everything please help. all i need are my messages to be backed up thats it.i can deal with losing everything else.
Thanks this is so stressful

Have you tried using iExplorer? I back up my messages that way.

[iWeekend]

Originally Posted by Cvzjoka

Does anyone else have a problem where they have 11gb of other data on their phone. I cannot do anything on my iphone because of the lack of space. I went to apple and they said they have no idea why this is happening. Ive tried everything please help. all i need are my messages to be backed up thats it.i can deal with losing everything else.
Thanks this is so stressful

If you have truely done all of the above steps, then ... you might have to SSH in to the file system (i use my ftp program) and then manually hunt down the offending files. After jailbreaking of course. I don't believe this was mentioned.

YMMV and good luck.

[Xenomorph]

iOS 6.1 fixed a huge bug that was causing the system to save SMS attachments, forever.

Even if you "deleted" them in a conversation, they were still on your device.


So, yeah. A clean install of 6.1 is a good start.

[taylob]

Originally Posted by Xenomorph

iOS 6.1 fixed a huge bug that was causing the system to save SMS attachments, forever.

Even if you "deleted" them in a conversation, they were still on your device.


So, yeah. A clean install of 6.1 is a good start.

So it wont take affect just installing 6.1. I still have over 4 gigs of "Other." What do you recommend I do? I dont care about losing anything but my pictures.

[BumpyFlatline]

[/COLOR]

Originally Posted by Hf44

I have tried icloud, but my data is 4 GB, and my other is 3GB so i cant do that, as my limit is 5 on icloud.

I guess ill try to restore as a brand new phone. I will use appbackup for my app data. For my contacts, sms, and pictures, any ideas? I would like to get my pictures back to my camera roll.



I have an application that browses backups. And lets me export data from one, and i can transger it to a back up with virtually nothing there. I just dont know which files exactly. Bad idea?

I must not have made myself clear. Sorry for that. I also have the 5GB iCloud plan. What I'm saying is, use iCloud to save contacts, email, calendars, etc. Photos take up an ungodly amount of space to save in iCloud. I just copy my entire camera roll to my computer to save the space in iCloud. If you use Photo Stream then I believe you need to use iCloud. But if you don't use that, then just manually save the photos to your computer. Then use AppBackup to backup up each app's data individually and then copy all that to your computer. I can send you a link to step by step instructions for AppBackup if you'd like. Once you have everything backed up, then DFU Restore as New to 6.1. Set up iCloud on the new firmware. Then jailbreak the phone, install all your apps, then use AppBackup to restore all your apps back to their exact previous state. If there are apps you haven't used in a while then skip the installation of said app. You'll always have a copy of the backup. For example, I have game saves from my 3G. Right now I don't have a lot of those games installed. But if I ever get the urge to play that game again, I just install it and restore the data via AppBackup. When I do that, it's EXACTLY how I left it the last time I backed it up via AppBackup. The good thing is, all of the backed up data doesn't take up a lot of space. So after I jailbreak a new firmware, I copy the entire AppBackup folder from my computer back to my iphone. Then as you install each app from the app store, you'll see it appear in AppBackup. All's you do is tap on the app, then tap restore. Once you do that, the app is back to the EXACT way you left it. AppBackup works for every single app in the app store too. iCloud is getting better at saving game saves and general app data, but its not a universal solution yet. AppBackup is perfect for this type of situation. I swear by that app. Plus it's free.

Anyways, that's just my opinion. Others will suggest iBye or PKGBackup. Those are fine alternatives too. I'm just familiar with AppBackup and have been using it for years now. I find it very easy it is to use. Good luck!

Edit: iCleaner is a very handy app. I always keep that installed on my phone and run it about once a month to clean out unnecessary junk. It'll get rid of a ton of stuff but I highly doubt that it will remove the 4GB of other. Like dhlizard and myself have said, the way you get "other" back to the smallest amount possible is to restore as new. I suggest you do a DFU Restore as New.

[Hf44]

Originally Posted by BumpyFlatline

[/COLOR]

I must not have made myself clear. Sorry for that. I also have the 5GB iCloud plan. What I'm saying is, use iCloud to save contacts, email, calendars, etc. Photos take up an ungodly amount of space to save in iCloud. I just copy my entire camera roll to my computer to save the space in iCloud. If you use Photo Stream then I believe you need to use iCloud. But if you don't use that, then just manually save the photos to your computer. Then use AppBackup to backup up each app's data individually and then copy all that to your computer. I can send you a link to step by step instructions for AppBackup if you'd like. Once you have everything backed up, then DFU Restore as New to 6.1. Set up iCloud on the new firmware. Then jailbreak the phone, install all your apps, then use AppBackup to restore all your apps back to their exact previous state. If there are apps you haven't used in a while then skip the installation of said app. You'll always have a copy of the backup. For example, I have game saves from my 3G. Right now I don't have a lot of those games installed. But if I ever get the urge to play that game again, I just install it and restore the data via AppBackup. When I do that, it's EXACTLY how I left it the last time I backed it up via AppBackup. The good thing is, all of the backed up data doesn't take up a lot of space. So after I jailbreak a new firmware, I copy the entire AppBackup folder from my computer back to my iphone. Then as you install each app from the app store, you'll see it appear in AppBackup. All's you do is tap on the app, then tap restore. Once you do that, the app is back to the EXACT way you left it. AppBackup works for every single app in the app store too. iCloud is getting better at saving game saves and general app data, but its not a universal solution yet. AppBackup is perfect for this type of situation. I swear by that app. Plus it's free.

Anyways, that's just my opinion. Others will suggest iBye or PKGBackup. Those are fine alternatives too. I'm just familiar with AppBackup and have been using it for years now. I find it very easy it is to use. Good luck!

Edit: iCleaner is a very handy app. I always keep that installed on my phone and run it about once a month to clean out unnecessary junk. It'll get rid of a ton of stuff but I highly doubt that it will remove the 4GB of other. Like dhlizard and myself have said, the way you get "other" back to the smallest amount possible is to restore as new. I suggest you do a DFU Restore as New.

Thats what i have done. I got rid of the attachments in all my text by only extracting my SMS.db file, and contacts. Backed up my app data, the only mission now is to find out how to put my photos back in the camera roll.. thank you for your generous help.

[BumpyFlatline]

Originally Posted by Hf44

Thats what i have done. I got rid of the attachments in all my text by only extracting my SMS.db file, and contacts. Backed up my app data, the only mission now is to find out how to put my photos back in the camera roll.. thank you for your generous help.

Awesome! You are very welcome. Putting photos back onto the phone is pretty easy. The easiest way is to just use iTunes. Place all the photos in a folder on your computer, connect your phone, click on the photos tab, place a checkmark in the "Sync Photos From" box, then choose the folder with all your pictures. Then just sync them to the phone. Or you can use the Dropbox app from the App Store. In this case, you would copy the folder with all the photos to Dropbox. Then open the Dropbox app and download the photos to your phone. That is a pretty time consuming process but it definitely works. I've read about people using an app called Photo Transfer App from the App Store. I have no experience with that though. Another option would be to use iFunBox or iFile to copy them to your phone. Just google the options to figure out what would be best for you. Good luck! Let me know if you have any questions or problems!

Edit: I just tried using iTunes to make sure what I was saying was true. And I was reminded why I only use iTunes for DFU Restores and instead use a combination of iCloud and AppBackup to backup my device. You can easily use iTunes to sync an entire folder of photos to your phone. But if you ever want to delete the photos off of your phone it gets a little annoying because you can't just go into the Camera Roll and delete an individual photo. For whatever reason, there is no way to eaily delete the photo. I just synced a couple photos to my phone and realized this. Does anyone know why can't I delete them? Very strange. I'm sure you could use iFile but I do not know where the folder is located. I know where the Camera Roll folder is located but not the new folder which is created by iTunes. If possible, you should just skip using iTunes to put the photos onto your device unless you don't care about not being able to easily delete them.

I just found this thread here at MR discussing this matter. Here's a link. http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1314308

Looks like someone else has had great success using that Transfer app. But in situations like these, I always use iFunBox to get files from my computer to my phone. Once I move photos from my phone to my computer I hardly ever put them back on my phone. And when I do, it's usually just a small amount of them and I use the DropBox app. I do it this way because I can easily save any photo to my camera roll and they can be easily deleted unlike when I sync with iTunes. If you have a couple hundred photos then DropBox is a terrible idea. So if anyone knows anther way to copy them to the Camera Roll please speak up. I know where the camera roll folder is located, but when you copy photos there they don't show up in the Camera Roll even though when you access the folder via iFile or iFunBox the file is definitely there.

OP, sorry I couldn't be absolutely clear on the photos situation. I'm going to do some googling to find a solution. How many photos are you trying to transfer back into your camera roll?

[Cvzjoka]

Nothing is working FML 11.4 gb now

[Cvzjoka]

Originally Posted by iaymnu

Have you tried using iExplorer? I back up my messages that way.

how do u back it up? like what do you click. or do u just copy to desktop?

----------

Originally Posted by bushido

i always use iCleaner, its in Cydia

icleaner only removed 400mb...the rest is still there...idk what to do.

[iWeekend]

In an attempt to answer my own question (remove via file delete, above), and to add to what is turning into MR's own mega-thread on "other data", I present links to other sites' mega threads on the subject. Which generally restates what this thread says, said in a different way.

The salient points I gleaned from them a) "other" isn't necessarily "bad" data, just not classified as "audio, apps, or photos" (although some of it is garbage for sure) b) restore as new



https://discussions.apple.com/thread...art=0&tstart=0

http://www.iphonefaq.org/archives/97281



PS icleaner only removed .5gig of my 2.2gig of "other" too. I'll forgo the slight inconvenience of a fresh restore for now.

[Cvzjoka]

Originally Posted by guitarmandp

Also try deleting the attachments folder after you've jailbroken

where is this folder?

[guinvere]

Apple has admitted that 99% of that "Other" used space is because there is a bug in the SMS software. Even though you have deleted your sent messages so you can't see them, they are NOT getting deleted from your phone. Naturally, you can only access the folder /library/sms/attachment by using DiskAid or iExplorer, and even then, you can only SEE them. To actually delete the files, apparently you need to jailbreak your phone.

I have 2.4 gb of Other "used" space. ALL of that is undeleted attachments because of the software glitch. I delete all of my messages on a daily basis, but the phone stores them anyway.

I am debating going through the whole jailbreak process just to clean out the Other crap.

Edit: I have a 4s with 5.1.1. I won't let Apple "update" me to 6.1.

[sumsingwong]

nevermind....

[Enjoylife1788]

Originally Posted by BumpyFlatline

[/COLOR]

I must not have made myself clear. Sorry for that. I also have the 5GB iCloud plan. What I'm saying is, use iCloud to save contacts, email, calendars, etc. Photos take up an ungodly amount of space to save in iCloud. I just copy my entire camera roll to my computer to save the space in iCloud. If you use Photo Stream then I believe you need to use iCloud. But if you don't use that, then just manually save the photos to your computer. Then use AppBackup to backup up each app's data individually and then copy all that to your computer. I can send you a link to step by step instructions for AppBackup if you'd like. Once you have everything backed up, then DFU Restore as New to 6.1. Set up iCloud on the new firmware. Then jailbreak the phone, install all your apps, then use AppBackup to restore all your apps back to their exact previous state. If there are apps you haven't used in a while then skip the installation of said app. You'll always have a copy of the backup. For example, I have game saves from my 3G. Right now I don't have a lot of those games installed. But if I ever get the urge to play that game again, I just install it and restore the data via AppBackup. When I do that, it's EXACTLY how I left it the last time I backed it up via AppBackup. The good thing is, all of the backed up data doesn't take up a lot of space. So after I jailbreak a new firmware, I copy the entire AppBackup folder from my computer back to my iphone. Then as you install each app from the app store, you'll see it appear in AppBackup. All's you do is tap on the app, then tap restore. Once you do that, the app is back to the EXACT way you left it. AppBackup works for every single app in the app store too. iCloud is getting better at saving game saves and general app data, but its not a universal solution yet. AppBackup is perfect for this type of situation. I swear by that app. Plus it's free.

Anyways, that's just my opinion. Others will suggest iBye or PKGBackup. Those are fine alternatives too. I'm just familiar with AppBackup and have been using it for years now. I find it very easy it is to use. Good luck!

Edit: iCleaner is a very handy app. I always keep that installed on my phone and run it about once a month to clean out unnecessary junk. It'll get rid of a ton of stuff but I highly doubt that it will remove the 4GB of other. Like dhlizard and myself have said, the way you get "other" back to the smallest amount possible is to restore as new. I suggest you do a DFU Restore as New.

Where does appbackup store it's backup files. I ran appbackup and took backup of all apps. But issue is that I am not able to find to be able to copy to the PC.

Could you please share the path? Thanks

Edit: I found it. Anyways thanks