Anyone know if it's possible to view and edit the backup 'lzf' files on a computer?
It could provide some useful abilities, like batch renaming or editing of rules, and might even help when transferring hubs.
Not possible to my knowledge and I have never seen anyone post about doing so either. Remember, a lot about your devices is stored on your stick, not in the backup file. So, don't even know if that would be possible at all.
That's one of the reasons I'm looking for an edit capability. If I move a backup as-is from the old hub to the new hub, the devices won't work.
But... if I first move all the devices over (by hand), then take a backup of the new hub, I can get the new device IDs, and somehow script them into the backup from the old hub. This would let me at least retain all the Rules, Groups, Button Controllers, etc. that use the devices (which is really the most important part of having the hub 
)
Yeah, doesn't work that way. And even if it did, I doubt HE would allow it. People would totally screw everything up. What if you picked the wrong device to replace it with that didn't have the same capabilities. You're going to end up with a very screwed up database. And HE staff don't have time to be picking through all that mess.
I do find it funny that so many threads have been devoted to people replacing their hubs when they die but I have yet to see a thread about someone complaining that theirs did.
My old hub still works, but compared to the new one it is a huge eyesore 
So migrating serves two purposes: test my restore plan in case a hub breaks, as well as make the hub corner look cleaner.
And sure, my hub is currently working, but there are any number of reasons that could require me to use a new hub. It makes me more apprehensive about investing time in setting up my current hub if I lose all of it (permanently!) to, e.g., a storm surge, or a cabinet breaking, or a pipe bursting, or a break-in, or ...
In comparison, when I lost a computer to a storm surge, not only was I able to restore everything, I also had the option to pick and choose what to restore, leaving behind some things that didn't make sense on the new computer. But Hubitat seems determined to make me redo everything from scratch.
I see your end state and can see why it would be wanted.
But, personally I think backups should not be editable. I say this from a rare security standpoint that if it was modified for malicious purposes it could lead to bad things.
I’ll go crawl back into my smart cave and put my tinfoil hat back on. 
There's no reason you'd need to lose "all of it permanently." As you know, you can download backups and store them wherever you want. This backup is the hub database, which among other things includes apps you have installed, custom app and driver code, hub/location settings, and more. It also includes your device database, though as you are obviously aware, that alone isn't necessarily enough in all cases. But even as-is, these "associations" are all you'd lose, and the fix would be to plug the devices you were using back into the automations (apps) you were using them in if that device needed to be re-joined. As you're aware, that's probably not fun, but unless your C5 hub dies or your C4 (or C3) stick dies, you won't need to do that.
It would certainly be great (and ease the minds of many) if there were a backup/migration tool. There are a few challenges for Z-Wave and Zigbee, but probably nothing that can't be overcome. The Z-Wave stick (or presumably now internal chip on the C5) stores information about the Z-Wave devices. Stick users can already use third-party software to back up, restore, or shift controllers, so with enough resources (and I'm not saying their time is best spent here), Hubitat could probably write something similar. Everything on the hub side for Zigbee is in just the hub's database, but Zigbee devices themselves store the hub/coordinator's ID and would need to be re-paired if that changes. I'm not sure what they could do to "fix" that "problem"--though I'd actually be curious if this problem even exists. Has anyone tried resetting and joining a ZigBee device to a Hubitat hub with a different Zigbee coordinator than the one the backup came from? As-is, if you reset/re-join a Zigbee device, Hubitat matches the device up via its 64-bit factory-set ID. (I've done this lots of times resetting sensors and moving them to ST for firmware updates, then moving them back to Hubitat without deleting the original device.) It's possible it would do this even if the coordinator/stick/hub changes, and given that some of this resets on the Zigbee device itself, I don't see how the hub can do any more here (if it does this, and if not, it would probably be quite easy to add).
I would have to agree that by the next revision and/or the majority of hubs outnumber the legacy stick hubs that there will need to be a way to restore your entire hub (stick, apps, database and all) from one hub to another. This will need to be addressed at some point. More than likely it will be addressed when another bad batch of devices get sent out and HE owners lose hours of time/configurations. Usually pain makes things a higher priority. Thankfully I have been blessed with a fairly stable device and stick. Hope it stays that way for awhile. 
