Skip to content

FAQ: Data

Jump to bottom
Michael Totschnig edited this page Jul 8, 2023 · 24 revisions

How to transfer data to a new device?

  1. On the old device, open the app, from the menu select Settings, and then select Backup.
  2. This will create a ZIP archive, that you need to copy to the new device:
    1. The easiest way to transfer the backup is to activate "Share exports and backups", before creating the backup, then you can select between any communication app, that you also use on the new device (Email, Signal, WhatsApp, etc.)
    2. Alternatively, select "Files" (the last entry in "Export / Backup" section), then select the last backup, and then click on Share.
  3. On the new device, open the app. The Restore functionality can be called
    1. either from the onboarding screen (on the third page with title "Let us set up your first account", in the bottom left corner, there is an icon representing a user, that opens a menu with entry "Restore local backup file").
    2. or, after having finished onboarding, from the menu select Settings, then select Restore (ZIP).
  4. Select the file, and confirm.

How do I delete app data? After uninstalling and re-installing the app, data seems automatically restored?

This happens, when you have opted into Google's backup of app data while you configured your device. In order to delete the data that My Expenses holds, you need to open the Application Manager from the System Settings, then select My Expenses, then Storage, then Clear Storage. If you only want to delete one or a few accounts in My Expenses, you can do so from the account list by long tapping on an account, and select Delete from the popup menu.

How can I backup my data for the case my device gets lost?

With My Expenses, your data is in your control, thus it is not stored on any servers. This also means that it is your responsibility to create manual backups or configure automatic backups.

On the one hand, if the app is installed from Play Store, you can opt in to Google's feature of backing up app data. My Expenses does cooperate with this feature. But neither the app, nor you have any control on the schedule, and there is no obvious way of checking that the backup works correctly.

On the other hand, My Expenses has its own auto-backup mechanism, which can store the backup files on a cloud storage. First you need to add a synchronization backend (You do not need to select any of your accounts for synchronization). Then on the screen where you activate auto-backup, you select the synchronization backend. The following video illustrates the setup: https://www.facebook.com/MyExpenses/videos/1884000248528111/

What are the different share options?

If you activate the option "Share exports and backups", you have the following options for setting "Upload URL":

  • If it is empty, each time you create an export or backup, the system will prompt you to select an app which will receive the file.
  • A mailto link (e.g. "mailto:[email protected]) will create a message in your email client with the given recipient, and the file as an attachment.
  • An ftp link (e.g. "ftp://login:[email protected]:port/my/directory/") will be handled by SendWithFTP if installed on the device.
  • Since version 3.3.9, you can also use an http(s) URL representing a resource which allows PUT requests, for example a WebDAV collection URL. Username and password can also be provided as part of the URL as shown in the ftp URL example.

How does database encryption work?

Currently (since version 3.5.0) encryption can only be activated during first run of the app. On the second screen of the Onboarding Wizard, there is a menu labeled "Experimental" with a "Encrypt database" item. If you want to make use of this feature with existing data, you must first create a backup, and reinstall the app. If you activate Encryption on the second screen, and then on the third screen select the backup archive to restore, it will be imported into an encrypted database. The passphrase is managed via Android's KeyStore and can not be extracted from the device. Consequently data will not be backed up via Androids backup service. When you create a backup from the app's settings, the database is decrypted. You can encrypt the backup archive by setting a "Passphrase for backups".

Clone this wiki locally