Windows Phone Backup / Restore can also restore App Data & Start Screen Tiles
The legendary Windows Phone 8 Backup / Restore system has always been said to be incomplete because it was mere restoration of apps which used to get reinstalled along with all email accounts for which password has to be re-provided. The biggest complaint was by consumers who had to re-arrange the tiles after that.
This is all set to change now with the new Backup and Restore system in place now.
- Start screen backup & restore across devices which includes restoration of every tile. icon/images are maintained, tiles are greyed out until apps are restored and launch context is preserved.
- OS will sync up Local or the IsoStore to OneDrive once per day. This is a great opportunity for developers and gamers to restore their apps when installed again or when users switch to another phone. However this is limited to only 100KB, anything more that, the sync will stop.
- Apps built using Silverlight 8.0 or XNA or Enterprise or Sideloaded will not be restored.
That said it will also be possible for apps to make use of the new Password Vault which can be used to securely store and roam user credentials across devices. This is possible when user uses the same account across multiple devices. This means if you have apps which uses some sort of password, they can use this along with backup system to restore everything completely.
This is an excellent news for consumers. This not only makes everything more personal, developers and users complaining about lost game progress and data loss, now have a better option. However this has to be strictly enabled from developer side.
