LINE Messenger backup/restore under microG?

Question

NOTE: I see the following similar discussion here: How to restore Line messages from Titanium Backup? Although that discussion offers a suggestion that might partially apply to what I want to ask here, it does not confirm the validity of that suggestion. Therefore, it does not actually answer my following question:

I'm thinking of switching to microG, but a stumbling block is LINE Messenger. I know that it can run under microG, but I also know that it can't normally back up and restore LINE Messenger chat history without access to Google Drive.

I have an idea of how I might be able to bypass this restriction, but I'm wondering if it actually would be feasible. Here's my idea ...

(1) Under my current non-microG Android OS, take a backup of /data/data/jp.naver.line.android

(2) Install microG, and then install LINE Messenger.

(3) Restore the previously backed up jp.naver.line.android to /data/data under the microG OS.

(4) Take periodic backups of /data/data/jp.naver.line.android as I use LINE under microG.

(5) If i ever want to restore my LINE history under microG, repeat step 3 with the latest jp.naver.line.android backup.

A variation might be to only back up and restore one or more appropriate sqlite databases that are resident within /data/data/jp.naver.line.android, instead of that entire directory tree.

I'm willing to experiment with this approach, but before I do, I'm wondering whether anyone has tried anything like this with LINE Messenger under microG.

Thank you in advance for any thoughts and suggestions.

UPDATE: Thanks to @Andrew-T for the pointer to the other discussion that I missed, which indeed confirms that backup and restore for the database under /data/data/jp.naver.line.android can actually be done.

I'm just wondering if anyone has actually gotten something like this to work specifically under microG. I'd like to switch to microG, but it would give me more confidence to take that step if anyone has already been able to do this in order to get full LINE functionality under that OS, including backup and restore.

FURTHER UPDATE: That other discussion is more than 7 years old, and sadly, it turns out that the information is outdated. The /data/data/jp.naver.line.android/databases directory that is referred to in that article doesn't contain the database that is mentioned. Furthermore, I checked each and every other database in that directory, and none of them contain any chat history.

I also checked all of the other files and directories under /data/data/jp.naver.line.android, and none of them contain any chat history, either.

This is consistent with LINE's decision a while ago to stop allowing local-storage backup and to make Google Drive the only location to where chat history can be backed up and restored from. In conjunction with that decision, LINE seems to have gotten rid of all local chat history data from its device-resident databases.

So, it looks like I'm out of luck regarding non-Google-based backup and restore for LINE.

However, I'll keep this question open for a while longer, in case it turns out that someone knows of another way I can manage Android-based LINE backups and restores without Google being in the picture.

PS: Hmm ... I wonder if it would be possible to create a fake "Google Drive" service which looks just like Google Drive to LINE, but which actually just manages a data store of my own.

I'm going to look into this and report back if I have any luck with this idea.

Answer 1

I figured out a workaround!!

I have an old Mac laptop. There is a Mac desktop version of LINE Messenger, and that version does allow chat history backups and restores.

So, I can run LINE under microG and just do the chat backups and restores on the Mac.

Also, I can run an Automator script on the Mac periodically when it's idle in order to start LINE, and then to issue the appropriate mouse clicks to go to the Settings and initiate the chat backup. This will allow me to keep the LINE chats backed up on a regular basis.

Also, I'm guessing that chat backups and restores will probably also be available on the Windows desktop version of LINE, in case anyone has a Windows box and wants to try the same thing.

This is probably the closest I can come to what I was originally asking for here, and it's an acceptable Answer to my question.

Now, I no longer have any obstacles to starting my official move to microG.

PS: If I want to get fancy, I could write a script on the Mac to initiate the Automater script that I described above, and I then could create a Tasker shortcut on my microG device to ssh to the Mac and invoke that script. This way, I could actually initiate the LINE chat history backup from my microG device.

And I could handle LINE chat history restores in these same ways.

PPS: And it turns out that the Mac LINE implementation optionally allows a proxy to be used between LINE and the backup/restore host. If I want to get really, really fancy some day, I might be able to write my own custom proxy server which emulates a connection to Google Drive, but which actually just saves the chat history in my own, personal data store.

That is a longer term project for some possibly never-arriving time in my future when I actually might find myself with a lot of spare time.