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[Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

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OperationNT
Posts: 161
Joined: Sun Jul 12, 2015 1:15 pm

[Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

Post by OperationNT »

Please download the archive "LargerFilesDumpMailTrick.zip" and unzip it!


Prerequisites:

- PS Vita with FW version between 3.00 and 3.52 (tested on FW 3.51)
- Email account which can be accessed through the PS Vita email application
- Computer with Mozilla Thunderbird installed and configurated
- Computer with QCMA installed (avoid some OpenCMA limitations) or any other solution which allow to read/write inside ux0:pspemu (PSP homebrew, Rejuvenate with VitaShell)


Preparation:

On computer with Mozilla Thunderbird:
- Create a new message
- Attach the file "LargerDump.png" (by drag&dropping the file inside the new message edition panel)
- Right-click on the file to rename it with the following name: "\..\..\..\email\message\mail.db" (remove the quotation marks)
- Send the message for the email account which is configured on the PS Vita email application

If your computer has QCMA (or even OpenCMA):
- Copy the folder "DUMP" inside your PSP saves for PS Vita folder (by default on Windows "%userprofile%\PS Vita\PSAVEDATA\vita_id_for_cma\")
- Send the PSP save named "DUMP" to your PS Vita

If you use a solution directly on your PS Vita:
- Create a directory named "DUMP" in the folder "ux0:pspemu/PSP/SAVEDATA/" (or "ms0:/PSP/SAVEDATA/")
- Restart your PS Vita

On the PS Vita email application:
- Open the message you previously send through Mozilla Thunderbird
- Click on the attachment
- When the panel "Cannot display this picture", completly close the email application (DO NOT CLICK ON "OK"!)
- Reopen the email application
- Reconfigure your email account access


Dump any file:

Send an email to your email account configurated on your PS Vita:
- The subject must be the path of the file (for example, "ux0:email/message/mail.db")
- Attach any file named "#1" (with a size of at least 1 byte, for example the file given in this archive)

Inside the PS Vita email application
- Open the email you just sent, the attachment should be renamed as something which starts with "\\..\\..\\..\\pspemu\\PSP\\SAVEDATA\\DUMP\\"
- On the right side, click on "Forward" button
- It should take some time to open the "Forward" message editor (the time depends on the file size)
- In the "Forward" message editor, set the airplane mode
- Click on the attachment and then on "See"
- It must "slitly" freeze and then display a "Cannot display this picture" message (or crash if the file you want to dump is too huge)
- Completly close the email application (DO NOT CLICK ON "OK"!)

If you use CMA on your computer:
- Simply backup the PSP save file "DUMP"
- OpenCMA will fail if a file you dumped has a name more than 8 characters or an extension with not exactly 3 characters, use QCMA instead

If you use a solution directly on your PS Vita:
- The dumped file should be inside "ms0:/PSP/SAVEDATA/DUMP" or "ux0:pspemu/PSP/SAVEDATA/": do as you wish with it!


Limitations:

The dumping process in the email application is hazardous:
- Sometimes it fails (especially if there was no freeze before the "Cannot display this picture" message)
- In this case, restart your PS Vita and repeat the dump phase inside the PS Vita email application
- Sometimes you can directly click on the attachment (no need to go inside "Forward"), particularly if you successly dump the file at least one time

- The file path must at least contains a '/', if the file is at the root of the targeted partition, add a '/' after ':' (for example, "ux0:/id.dat")
- If the file is too huge, the email application will crash (in my case, it was when the file was bigger than 16MB but it is not a fixed limit)


Thanks to mr.gas for all his hints ;)
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Attachments
LargerFilesDumpMailTrick.zip
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niszczycielnpc
Posts: 259
Joined: Thu Dec 19, 2013 12:10 pm
Location: %appdata%/Poland/Netherland

Re: [Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

Post by niszczycielnpc »

Hi nice tutorial i was able to dump my eboot.bin, license file and some other files from my wipeout game cadridge :D
Im now gonna try with bigger file maybe it will work ;)

EDIT// Yeah it crashed at about 19.2 mb my email app.
EDIT//2 Oh also after it don't freeze you don't need to restart you psvita just reopen email app ;)
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Recieire
Posts: 7
Joined: Mon Sep 15, 2014 10:33 am

Re: [Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

Post by Recieire »

Thank you for your tutorial and your time for studying and discovering the process through mr. gas hints with mail.db! :D
I really appreciate that. Do you have any thoughts on how to to dump entire folders with this method or with music/video database editing? I've searched but couldn't figure it out by myself...
OperationNT
Posts: 161
Joined: Sun Jul 12, 2015 1:15 pm

Re: [Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

Post by OperationNT »

Currently, we don't know any way to dump an entire folder content if we don't know each file name inside.
With music database trick, we can dump any file (without any size restriction) as long as it is on "ux0".

As you notice with this latest email trick, when you click on "Forward", there is a freeze (to open the "Forward" message editor). I suppose it's for a temporary copy and I think it's inside the directory represented by "\..\..\..". So we need to figure out what is this directory.

To do it, I already tried the following thing: send a file named "\..\..\Test.png" and then dump inside different folders ("ux0:email/Test.png", "ux0:picture/Test.png", ...). But I wasn't able to find the good one yet, maybe the file inisde this path is destroyed when the email application is closed :( .
niszczycielnpc
Posts: 259
Joined: Thu Dec 19, 2013 12:10 pm
Location: %appdata%/Poland/Netherland

Re: [Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

Post by niszczycielnpc »

As mr.gas said (now you only needs to dump it) so im 100% sure the file is somewhere there ;)

I now cant try but try this location (ux0:temp/test.png)

temp folder conteins files like this one ;)
Recieire
Posts: 7
Joined: Mon Sep 15, 2014 10:33 am

Re: [Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

Post by Recieire »

Ok I think that changing filename to "\..\..\..\folder" is only part of the the writing trick if I understood mr.gas's eml trick correctly, so I suppose this is needed to write a copy of our desired dump file to pspemu/PSP/SAVEDATA/DUMP/ (as you pointed this location in your SQL trigger code). The \..\..\..\ is basically the root of the memory card ux0. I figured this by looking into the pattern for every file installation through email like those for PSM+ when this new method to write files by changing email.db wasn't even released.
OperationNT
Posts: 161
Joined: Sun Jul 12, 2015 1:15 pm

Re: [Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

Post by OperationNT »

I already try all the possible known pathes (through an email containing a lot of differrent links like "email:send?attach=ux0:folder/Test.png.") and I did not get it :-(.
So I suppose it is contained in a path which is cleaned once mail app is closed.
mr.gas
Guru
Posts: 163
Joined: Sat Apr 05, 2014 6:35 pm
Location: YEMEN

Re: [Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

Post by mr.gas »

the original file is in ux0:email/messages /00/
.
but it get deleted when u cancel the forwarded mail or when u start the email app after it crashed ..
.
so u can edit the trigger to change the file path while the message forwarding still in process. . and save the orginal path in another table so u can get it later
izlude
Posts: 6
Joined: Thu Sep 24, 2015 7:43 am

Re: [Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

Post by izlude »

Mine works for any file size (but you'll have to think a bit in order to use it).
niszczycielnpc
Posts: 259
Joined: Thu Dec 19, 2013 12:10 pm
Location: %appdata%/Poland/Netherland

Re: [Tutorial] How to dump any file between 2MB and 16MB

Post by niszczycielnpc »

First set music database send to vita...
then just forward message wait till it done.
When its done minimalize (ps button) mail app DONT CLOSE IT!
Then simply dump to pc via content manager.
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