seedvault: .backup.metadata fails to upload to nextcloud

Same issue here, always .backup.metadata I’ve never had any other sync conflict. LineageOS 18.1

Same problem here on several LOS 18.1 phones using Seedvault with Nextcloud 20.0.11. First backup is working. Then you always get upload errors:

First problem is that Nextcloud asks the user. The backup procedure is triggered by Seedvault - so there shouldn’t be any user interactions necessary. Seedvault must answer these questions. Second problem is that even answering these questions doesn’t solve the problem and the user gets the notification including the question again and again.

I’m not able to say if it is a bug of Nextcloud Server, Nextcloud Android Client or Seedvault. Also I’m not able to say if backups with Seedvault & Nextcloud work at all. Because if only with the first upload the file is saved on the Nextcloud Server, you will make big eyes when you restore your backup and only the first version is restored which was uploaded the first time. Meaning all changes done after the first upload are gone. Then there should be a big warning to the community to NOT USE Seedvault together with Nextcloud.

Yes, it often gets overwritten, but the requests are made in the right order. It is just that Nextcloud isn’t handling this properly. Please try DavX5 instead.

This does not work. The error given by the ‘WebDAV mount’ method is identical to the ‘Nextcloud’ method.

From the remote server:

$ docker logs nextcloud-nc-1 | grep .backup.metadata xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx - xxxxx [xxx/xxx/xxx:xx:xx:xx +0000] “PUT /remote.php/dav/files/xxx/.SeedVaultAndroidBackup/1234567890/.backup.metadata HTTP/1.1” 403 1027 “-” “User/Agent String”

I agree with the OP, it is hard to tell who is to blame here but reading the bones I would blame the Nextcloud WebDAV implementation. This could be verified by using a different WebDAV implementation.

Regardless this leaves SeedVault in a nonfunctional state and this issue should not be closed.

What also does not work: Backup to local device and then uploading the local .SeedVaultAndroidBackup folder via the Nextcloud App results in the same error.

The only way I have found to make SeedVault work currently is to backup to local device and then use SyncThing to transport it to a PC and then work magic on that PC to do the actual upload to a secure location.

Seedvault supports any app properly supporting SAF, but needs to be whitelisted by the ROM. My ROM does have the DavX5 app whitelisted.

Does it fail to upload every time or is this only happening sometimes? Note that the metadata gets updated after every app, so failures are more likely to occur for that file.

Did you check the Uploads UI in the nextcloud app, if another upload attempt wasn’t successfully made for that file? Is it still shown as failed there?

In general, I am quite sure that this is a Nextcloud issue as Seedvault uses the Storage Access Framework and there’s not much we can do about how Nextcloud is implementing this.