Options to recover android native email app draft emails

[mft99]

Phone is a Moto X running Android 4.2.2, not rooted (yet?), native android email app with a hotmail email account. Everything works pretty well.

I had a bunch of draft emails in the native email app. Intended to finish & send them since I understood draft emails composed in the native app reside only on the device. But.. before I got around to doing that, yesterday I changed a sync setting on the phone which governs the hotmail account (Android Settings.. Accounts.. Corporate.. hotmail address) and it appears to have re-sync'd the whole hotmail account and removed all the drafts emails that were on the phone, now shows zero drafts. (I didn't intend to re-sync the whole email account).

Question: Is it possible to recover/extract those email drafts? Kinda want to have a plan before I proceed. Mobile data/wifi data is turned off in order to minimize potential file overwriting.

Option 1.. a) If the draft emails were marked deleted by the native email app could they still be on the phone's internal memory? And b) is there a way to recover/extract some or all of them from the phone's file system? (I'd be happy with anything including simple .txt format).

Option 2.. I have a MobileTrans backup of the Apps on the device from June/two months ago. Does that App backup file include draft emails written using the android native email app? Is the native email app even included in an App backup? I've not worked with or restored a MobileTrans App file yet. Couldn't find any answers on their website. I could just try to restore the June App backup and see what I get, but that could do a lot of overwriting on the phone including information since the June backup, so it's the last resort.

Sorry for the long message, tried to provide some detail. Any help or thoughts would be great.

 

[mft99]

Android stock email app, where are drafts stored locally?

Updated / shorter from previous post.

Moto-X, Android 4.2.2, using android stock email app with a hotmail account.

Had a bunch of draft emails (text only) composed using the android stock email app. Guess they're local only, not synced to a server. For unrelated reason, I changed a sync setting on the phone for this hotmail account (Android Bean Settings > Accounts > Corporate > Hotmail) and it appears to have re-sync'd the whole hotmail account and erased all my local drafts. Phone now shows zero drafts.

Wondering if the drafts are still there (or in data file), but not visible cuz marked as deleted by the app or OS? If so, maybe it's possible to recover/extract them? (I turned off Mobile data/wifi data in order to minimize potential file overwriting)

Anyone know where the android stock/native email app stores drafts in the OS file system?

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! I merged your two threads.

In general, I don't think you'll be able to recover those drafts. I believe emails on the stock Email app are saved in an SQLite database file in a protected system directory (much like SMS messages and locally saved contacts).

The drafts don't appear on your computer's email client, do they?

 

[mft99]

Thanks. They don't, the stock email app doesn't sync the drafts folder with a web/pc email client. Might be an issue with IMAP.
Any way to determine that filename where the stock app keeps drafts? I'm willing to root the phone and try to recover that file previously deleted or modified file, or parts of it. Even extracting part of the drafts would be better than nothing. Just taking long shots.

 

[mft99]

PS - maybe something along these lines? ... https://leanjavaengineering.wordpress.com/2014/06/10/android-email-extraction-to-eml/

It's beyond my knowledge level, but I'm willing to learn/try. Just looking for the body of about 10-15 draft emails. I'd be super happy just to get some of them. Don't need any attachments or address book stuff or anything else.

 

[B. Diddy]

That link's a good find! I think you're on the right track, but this is as far as I can go, since that goes way beyond my knowledge level as well ...

 

[mft99]

Thanks!
Hey to anyone on this forum who might have any suggestions or resources?

 

[Walton Tan]

PS - maybe something along these lines? ... https://leanjavaengineering.wordpress.com/2014/06/10/android-email-extraction-to-eml/

It's beyond my knowledge level, but I'm willing to learn/try. Just looking for the body of about 10-15 draft emails. I'd be super happy just to get some of them. Don't need any attachments or address book stuff or anything else.

Hi

Anyone has managed to retrieve with missing drafts from the above site and if so, able to generate a step by step guide ?

Thanks and much appreciated

 

[Walton Tan]

Hi mft99,

Were you able to retrieve your draft emails with the resources you have found?

 

[mft99]

Hi Walton, I haven't been able to find a way to retrieve the draft emails yet, but still trying. Have you found any resources or methods?

 

[mft99]

Hi Walton, just left you a reply on the different thread re same issue. Were you ever able to retrieve your lost draft emails? I haven't given up hope, I had a lot of drafts, dumb of me, but still trying to see if they are somewhere on the phone that I can retrieve, even in a raw text format, anything, would be fine. Any luck on your end?