Recovering Revelation password files from HDD via USB

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Augustas Kligys

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Sep 29, 2015, 12:14:01 PM9/29/15
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Hello,

I have a HDD which used to be inside the Laptop, but the Laptop is broken, and I can only access HDD information via USB.

Is it possible to transfer Revelation stored passwords from HDD files into a new Revelation installation?

Or perhaps there is anything else to be done in order to recover all the passwords?

Thank you,
Augustas

A. James Lewis

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Sep 29, 2015, 12:50:51 PM9/29/15
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If you can gain access to the files on the hard disk, then you only need to know what the filename used by your revelation was, and copy that file to a new system and open it... it is no different to what you would do to recover a word document in the same circumstances...
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Augustas Kligys

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Sep 29, 2015, 12:55:21 PM9/29/15
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If you can gain access to the files on the hard disk, then you only need to know what the filename used by your revelation was, and copy that file to a new system and open it... it is no different to what you would do to recover a word document in the same circumstances...

Thank you.

And how to know what is the name of the file, which stores all the encrypted passwords? 
And where it is located?

A. James Lewis

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Sep 29, 2015, 5:54:30 PM9/29/15
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I don't believe revelation has a default file name... it's like a word processor, at some point you must have created the file, saved it and configured revelation to open a specific file each time... revelation doesn't force a file extension, or register a mime type etc, because people generally don't want to make it easy to find the password file!

I can't easily see where revelation stores the data about what file to open automatically when it's opened... but I'm wondering, is it just that you forgot what you called the file, or did someone else create it?  If it's the latter, perhaps you could ask what it's called.

In a pinch, you could create a VM, restore the /home folder from the user in question to the VM, and then log in as that user!

James
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Augustas Kligys

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Sep 29, 2015, 6:03:51 PM9/29/15
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Thank you for the tip!
The thing is that the HDD is from my senior age friend who used Ubuntu.
So I will ask him if he remembers anything about specifying a filename during initial Revelation lunch/setup.

thanks.

A. James Lewis

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Sep 29, 2015, 6:13:08 PM9/29/15
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Encrypted files generally don't want to be found, but in that case you may well have a file called "my_passwords" or something similar laying around!...   Ask your friend if he had to open a file or if it just asked for a password (the latter case is where it's been configured to always open a specific file when opened).... he still may know what the file was called.

It might help if I knew how much experience you have with Ubuntu, because if I say... get an ISO for the same version of Ubuntu, install in a VM and restore the /home folders and create a user with the same name and log in, then when you start revelation it might open the right file for you!... I'm not too sure if you feel capable of doing that...
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Bopolissimus X Platypus

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Oct 1, 2015, 3:13:15 AM10/1/15
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I just had a look at my revelation file (and a new, empty rev file I
created) with od -a. It looks like revelation files have headers like
this:

$ od -a xx
0000000 r v l nul stx nul nul eot bel nul nul nul k V S N

$ od -a rev.rev
0000000 r v l nul stx nul nul eot bel nul nul nul @ dc1 - ]

so first 3 characters rvl followed by null stx nul nul eot bel nul nul
nul looks like what you're looking for. it's probably sufficient to
check that the first 3 characters are rvl.

something custom written in C would be good. but something like the
following will do the job, although more slowly, particularly since it
forks a two processes per file to be inspected.

copy the following into a file and then either chmod u+x that file or
just run it like this: sudo bash [filename]


#!/bin/bash

# this assumes the file is somewhere below where you
# are. you could run it from /, for example. or /home.
# if from / you probably want to run this as root, to
# avoid verbose errors with files you're not allowed to read

IFS=$'\n'

for fn in `find .`
do
if [ -f $fn ]
then
head -n 1 "$fn" | grep "^rvl" > /dev/null 2>&1
if [ $? == 0 ]
then
echo "$fn"
fi
fi
done
> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/revelation-password/560B0CD4.6000904%40fsck.co.uk.
>
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Augustas Kligys

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Oct 1, 2015, 5:59:25 PM10/1/15
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Thank you guys for all the tips.
It will take a bit of time for me to sort this situation out, as the friend and the HDD is not near at the moment, but I will report back with the results, once I have them.

Both suggestions from James and Bopolissimus sound very reasonable. It will help me a lot.

Greetings
Augustas

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Augustas Kligys

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Oct 16, 2015, 10:48:46 AM10/16/15
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Thank you bopolissimus!

Your information was very helpful.

Since I don't have Linux on hand, I made the hard disk to be read on Windows 7 (using the ext2fsd driver) and did the text search for "rvl". It immediately spoted the files I need ;)

I just now to see if my friend still has Linux installation or I have to install Revelation on some VM.



On Thursday, 1 October 2015 09:13:15 UTC+2, bopolissimus platypus wrote:
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