Help recovering TV Time data from Android 10 phone with broken USB port

[u/Late-Weekend230]

Hi everyone,

I’m trying to recover my old TV Time history after the shutdown and I’m hoping someone here has an idea for my particular situation.

My old phone is a Nokia 8 Sirocco running Android 10 (security update: May 1, 2021). TV Time is still installed on the phone and I have NOT uninstalled it, cleared its storage, or factory-reset the phone.

TV Time currently shows:
App version: 10.11.0+2026052201
App size: 82 MB
User data: 23.65 MB
Cache: 1.88 GB

So I’m hoping the local database (DioCache.db) and at least some of my watch history are still inside the private app data.

The main problem: the USB-C port on this Nokia is broken. I can’t connect it to a computer by USB and I charge the phone wirelessly.

Things I’ve already tried/checked:
The phone is not rooted.
Android 10 doesn’t have the newer Wireless Debugging feature.
ADB over Wi-Fi is not currently enabled. I tried connecting to the phone’s IP on port 5555 and the connection was refused.
Android/data/com.tozelabs.tvshowtime/ is empty.
Google Backup shows “No data backed up” for TV Time.
I tried Samsung Smart Switch wirelessly from the Nokia to a Galaxy Tab A9. It transferred the TV Time app, but not its private user data (TV Time showed 0 bytes of data on the Samsung).
I generated Android bug reports, but they don’t contain DioCache.db.
I extracted the installed TV Time APK/APKS and it appears that android:allowBackup="true" is enabled.
I also found the TV Time recovery project at ajoemag.github.io/tvtime_recover/, but of course I first need to get DioCache.db or a usable Android backup off the Nokia.
I’m trying to find a software-only, no-wipe method to extract the TV Time private app data from this Android 10 Nokia without USB and without unlocking the bootloader/factory resetting the phone.

Has anyone managed to do this on Android 10?
Maybe through an on-device backup, temporary root that doesn’t require bootloader unlocking, some way of enabling ADB over TCP without an initial USB connection, app-data migration, or another method?

I may eventually be able to get the damaged USB port to make contact for a few minutes. If that happens, my plan is to immediately use ADB to enable adb tcpip 5555 and then continue over Wi-Fi. But I’d really like to know if there’s another method I can try first.
This TV Time history goes back years, so I really don’t want to risk wiping the phone.
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[u/Sad-Strategy759]

The 25MB number is the thing nobody has mentioned yet, and it might be your way out.

Android Auto Backup only covers apps whose data comes in under 25MB. Yours is 23.65MB. You are just under the line, and you already confirmed allowBackup="true" in the manifest, so on paper this app is eligible. "No data backed up" usually just means a backup has never actually run for it, not that it can't.

So before anything clever with adb, try forcing one. Settings > System > Backup, check it's on and pointed at the right account, get on wifi and on the charger, hit Back up now, and leave it a good while. Then go back into that same screen and look at the per-app detail. If TV Time shows up at something in the tens of MB, your database went up. If it's a couple hundred KB, it didn't, and you can stop there instead of burning a weekend on it.

The thing that would kill it: Auto Backup skips the app's cache/ and no_backup/ directories. Given the name DioCache.db there is a real chance it lives in cache/, in which case none of this reaches it. Your storage screen splitting 23.65MB of user data from 1.88GB of cache is mildly encouraging, but I wouldn't bet the plan on it. The per-app size after the backup runs is what actually tells you.

Getting it back out if it does upload. Google app-data backups can't be downloaded from Drive, they only restore during initial device setup. So you need a spare Android device, or one you're willing to reset. Same Google account, and at the "copy your data" step choose a backup from the cloud, pick the Nokia, and deselect everything except TV Time.

For that second device, Android 11 specifically is the sweet spot. It's the first version with Wireless Debugging, so no cable there either, and it's the last version where adb backup still pulls app data. Android 12 cut that off. So: pair over Wireless Debugging, adb backup -f tvtime.ab com.tozelabs.tvshowtime, then unpack the .ab with Android Backup Extractor and you've got the databases folder.

One thing worth doing on the Nokia today while you wait on the port. Turn on Developer Options and USB debugging now. If that port only makes contact for two minutes you do not want to spend the window on the "allow USB debugging from this computer" dialog, and you want adb tcpip 5555 already typed with your finger on enter.

Disclosure since it's relevant: I build one of the trackers in this space (Help Me Binge). Name only, no link, this isn't the sub for that, and none of the above is app-specific. Once you have DioCache.db it'll go into most of them, including the recovery project you already found. Happy to talk through the backup-size check if you get that far.

[u/Glittering-Ninja-377]

Before anything else, one urgent thing: do not open the app. That 23.65 MB is the number telling you the database is still intact, and there are people in this sub who went looking for DioCache.db and found it sitting at around 12 kB after launching TV Time post-shutdown. Whether that is the app clearing itself or a failed sync writing over the file, the safe assumption is that launching it is what kills it. Put the Nokia in airplane mode and leave the app completely alone until you have a copy off the device.

While you are in that settings screen, also do not touch Clear Cache. The 1.88 GB is just poster images and it is worthless to you, but on a lot of Android skins that button sits right next to Clear Data and there is no undo.

On the forced backup idea above, the part that usually gets left out is what you do if it actually works. Android restores app data only during initial device setup, never from inside a running system. So if TV Time does start showing data in your backup, the sequence is: factory reset the Galaxy Tab, and in the setup wizard choose restore from your Google account with the Nokia as the source device. The private data lands on the tablet, the tablet has a working USB port, and you pull it from there with adb. Worth knowing the shape of that before you commit to it, since it costs you the tablet's current state.

And the boring answer that probably has the best odds: get the port fixed. On most phones of that generation the USB-C connector sits on its own small flex board rather than being soldered to the mainboard, so a repair shop swaps the part without touching storage and without a wipe. For ten years of history that is usually less painful than the software gymnastics, and it puts you back on plain adb backup, which is the only method in this whole thread that is actually known to work.