XPost: comp.mobile.android
From: robin_listas@es.invalid
On 2026-01-27 21:48, Frank Slootweg wrote:
> Frank Slootweg wrote:
>> Herbert Kleebauer wrote:
>>> On 1/26/2026 10:27 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
>>>> On 2026-01-26 22:07, Herbert Kleebauer wrote:
>>>
>>>>> A few days ago I exported a >500 MByte chat. I saved it locally on the
>>>>> phone and then transferred the zip file to the PC with ftp (using
>>>>> "primitive ftpd" on the phone and "Windows Explorer" on the PC) . I
>>>
>>>> What format has the chat?
>>>
>>> The chat is exported as a zip file. It contains the chat as .txt
>>> file (utf-8 including smileys.) and all pictures, videos, pdfs etc.
>>> in the original format.
>>
>> I did a test for one Chat/person. I got the .txt file with the text of
>> the messages (with the smileys, etc.), pictures (.jpg), audio (.opus),
>> videos (.mp4), but did *not* get PDFs (there should be two).
>>
>> For a PDF, the ,txt file says
>>
>> 8/27/25, 20:30 - Frank Slootweg: DOC-20250827-WA0004. (file attached)
>>
>> but the file is not included in the .zip file. N.B. in the above line it
>> looks like the file does not have an extension (which would be a
>> problem), but the file in the original chat *is* a PDF and is opened by
>> for example the (Google) 'Drive PDF Viewer. But also in that viewer, the
>> name is shown without an extension: "DOC-20250827-WA0004." (note the dot
>> at the end). So something is fishy.
>
> The missing PDF mystery is solved!
>
> I was again thinking about the missing extension and especially about
> the dot at the end of the filename.
>
> It turns out that (Windows) File Explorer does not show such files. I
> opened the .zip file with the 7-Zip program and lo and behold there
> were the 'missing' files! I just clicked on them and (Google) Chrome was
> quite happy to open them, never mind the missing extension.
Ah. Good.
>
>> Also that PDF was attached to a small message and that message
>> ("Huisregels Dutch GP") is not in the .txt file. Very strange!
>
> This *is* still a mystery, because that text should be in the .txt
> file, but isn't (and it's also not in the PDF).
>
>> Other than these two missing PDFs, the .zip file seems to contain
>> everything.
>>
>> BUT, as I think Carlos hinted at, if a message contains a quote of an
>> earlier message (as we do on Usenet), the quote is not in the .txt file,
>> only the response is. So something like
>>
>> "Yes"
>>
>> and then you have to guess to what the "Yes" applies. This particular
>> chat had two of these missing quotes.
That's bad.
>>
>> Bottom line: Somewhat useful, but not very much.
Right.
Still, the tool from "https://github.com/mtln/chat-export" that Herbert
Kleebauer mentioned, that runs on a computer, makes the zip export
readable. It is incomplete, though.
Arlen mentioned two other tools:
which I understand run on the phone. One extracts the encoding key for
the chats files, the other reads a chat and produces a working html. Is
it a better quality file?
But Arlen mentions a Windows GUI, so I am confused.
There is a readme there.
🛑⚠WhatsApp Viewer does not work with the latest WhatsApp database
format. ⚠🛑
Well, that's bad.
«You need root access to your phone. If you don't know what it is:
Wikipedia»
Well, I'm done, out.
And it is a Windows program; I use Linux.
What exactly it needs root access for, it doesn't say.
You need root access to your phone. If you don't know what it is:
Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rooting_%28Android%29)
Download your WhatsApp database and key files:
/data/data/com.whatsapp/files/key
/data/data/com.whatsapp/databases/msgstore.db
/data/data/com.whatsapp/databases/wa.db
Open WhatsApp Viewer
File -> Open -> Select file
Select msgstore.db in the folder "extracted"
Leave account name empty, is was used for older versions of
WhatsApp (crypt5)
Optional: If you want, you can import contact names from the wa.db file
Maybe those 3 files are only accessible being root on the phone?
--
Cheers, Carlos.
ES🇪🇸, EU🇪🇺;
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)
|
