Why does Android not have a built-in File Manager? - Android Software/Hacking General [Developers Only]

It doesn't make any sense. I would understand if it would be to protect users against going in system folders and so. But if it was even for just the SD card, it would be a blessing.

I think the approach we have on mobile devices is different than we have on desktop PCs (Windows, Linux, whatever)
You don't need to bother about your data because the apps responsible for it handle it for you.
People like you and me who still want to have more access can download a File explorer from market so I don't really see a problem here.

I agree. It seems nuts to not have a built-in file explorer. (Especially coming from Windows mobile, which has a robust file system explorer)
I can only hope the omission is due to Androids open-source nature, figuring that different people will want to use different explorers available on the market, or even develop one themselves if none fit their likes.
from my lowrider virus supermachine

I can see both sides of this.
As a simple user, no file manager is needed - all file types can be easily edited. Just search on the Market, and you will get an app for reading eBooks, doc files, viewing powerpoint presentations or movies, listening music, recording sounds, editing stuff, etc.
As a modder, you need a proper manager what can go everywhere - and I found terminal emulator to be the best. You want to edit text files not found by any app, or edit /system, etc.
As a phone manufacturer, you want nobody to wonder into your system folders. Hackers will do it any way, but the normal user should not do that. I hate this angle of view, but it's HTC+Android (read: Google). Nokia, Samsung, Huawei, SE, and all the bigger manufacturers always made file browsers available (at a basic level), but I've never used the built in for more than a few minutes (to install another one).

Related

Nub question - Opening file in subfolder

Hi guys, hopefully a stupid noob question that I can't seem to figure out.
I'm a bit of an organizational freak (as I'm sure many of you are), and like having sub-folders within main folders.
For example, I have some e-books on my Fuze and like having sub-folders with the author name.
So, folder structure looks like
\Storage_Card\ebooks\Edgar_Allen_Poe\...
When I go to open an ebook in MobiPocket, I cannot see that sub-folder (only the main path to ebooks).
The same issue plagues me with other programs, such as PocketNester...I'm assuming it has something to do with the Windows Mobile method of scanning directories in the file open dialog.
Anybody else have this problem?
I have noticed this in other apps, but never used mobipocket, so I think it's the behavior of the WinMo file manager as well. Maybe you need to put your directories on the root of the storage card. Have you tried shortcuts? Doubt it will work and it would probably drive you nuts that your shortcuts arent neatly organized in subfolders...
I don't think you can use sub-folders with mobipocket (or ereader). If you want things organized, then I would do something like put #'s or letters at the start of each author's books to keep them organized together (1-xxx, 1-yyy for the 1st author, 2-aaa, 2-bbb for the second, where the xxx's are the book names).
I find the file explorer in some apps pretty annoying, too. Like in pocket rar, you can create an archive for things like cab files. If you want to add to the archive, then it has to be on the storage card and in the root of any of the main folders on the storage card. That is annoying as crap. There are other situations where you can save a file in either main memory or storage memory, and you'll only have access to root folders, or sometimes in the main memory only to the folders in \my documents. It's like the person who designed this crap was auditioning for a job with apple to work on iphone development. I wish I knew a work-around (other than cutting-and-pasting after saving things), but I don't.

[Q] How to create an intranet on Droid X?

How to create an intranet on Droid X or Android
Hi, I'm a newbie and hope this has not been asked before. I have transferred 20,000 + html files and some pdf files (consisting of primarily text) to my Droid X. They are stored in a folder on my SD card. I can locate the folder. However, all of the file managers require that the entire folder be read before I can even dream of opening one of the files in that folder for viewing.
After an interminable wait, I see all of the 20,000 plus files but cannot get to the one I want to open which links to the other files. In other words, I have 20,000 + files on my SD card that, effectively speaking, I can neither access nor view. This is a database of legal cases and statutes, etc. which I need for my work. I would love to be able to search for specific text as well but first things first. On my office and home computers, these files are conveniently linked by a html menu system (local html files) which permits easy and rapid access. I would like to re-create this menu system and the ease of use on my Droid X. Essentially, what I need is the ability to create a local intranet on my Droid X using one of the Droid browers (e.g. Dolphin, Opera, Galpagos, etc.)
I have tried the local webserver solution which is inadequate and too cumbersome. Obviously, the Android file managers are hopeless for this task.
If this problem cannot be solved, I am faced with two other undesirable situations. 1. I can
open an account on a cloud server and upload my files to it, which would probably permit me to access them by my Droid X the way that any web page on the Web can be accessed. The other solution is using a remote access type program to access my office or home computer to see the files. From previous experience with the latter option (using my office computer from my home computer), it is painfully slow. Since I have roughly 4 gigs of html data I want to access, I would prefer to avoid the (albeit minimal) expense of a subscription for use of a cloud.
Any advice which would permit me to quickly and efficiently access and view my html files on the Droid would be most appreciated. Free apps, if applicable, would be preferred, but I am getting desperate. I have tried webservers, eg I-Jetty, etc., and I have tried Astro File manager and similar apps. They do not even come close to what I want. I have learned that Android has forbidden this kind of access/viewing (the kind I need) due to security concerns.
Any apps? Any fixes? Workarounds?
Essentially, what I seek to do is transfer what is akin to an intranet on my office and home computers on my Droid X. Please offer any advice.
Thanks to one and all.
Phil
Sounds like what you want is actually a web server app for Android. I did a quick Google, and it looks like there are some apps that can do that for you. So long as you don't open any ports on your phone, the site shouldn't be accessible from outside your phone (but I could be wrong about that).
http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=android+web+server

[Q] Tech explanation as to why TF101 can't natively open multiple docs at same time

Hi,
I was wondering if anyone could give me a semi-technical reason as to why you can't open multiple documents natively with the transformer. Natively, it's impossible open up document1.doc and then have document2.doc open at the same time and quickly switch between the 2 documents without having to manually find and reopen the other file.
At first, I thought it was something like the same application couldn't have 2 instances open at once as an OS limitation. However, it IS possible to have the same application with 2 different documents open at once but not without using multiple file managers (theres a vid on transformerforums demonstrating that if you open different files with the same app, but via different file managers, you can switch between multiple docs)
So why isn't it possible just to have 2 instances of the same application opened with different files without having to do multiple file explorer work around?
Also, do you think this will be/is without the work around in ICS?
Thanks in advanced
I don't think there is anything in Android that limits you to only a single document open at a time.. I think rather it is simply a limitation of the app you're using. If the developer had created a tabbed workspace or some other method of navigating through multiple documents opened simultaneously, it should work even with Honeycomb or Gingerbread. There's no reason to think that simply updating to Ice Cream Sandwich will add this feature to the app as it exists.. the developer will need to add in this functionality.
Have you tried a different app for viewing/editing your documents?
That's true, problem would be solved with tabbed browsing. Can you suggest a decent office style suite that supports tabbed browsing?
However, it's not possible to open multiple instances of pretty much any apps from what I can tell - that seems to be a limitation of the operating system does it not? But at the same time, it's not an OS limitation, because it is possible using multiple explorers to do a work around to have multiple instances open, but not without an impractical work around.
I find it strange that when I use the explorer to open a word document in any other app, it still appears on the "multi-task" bit as the explorer application. If I load the explorer app again (say to navigate to a different file) it closes the document I opened.
Thanks in advanced
You say explorer like ur talking about windows lol. Kinda confusing to picture exactly what ur doing, but i think i get it. As far as i know, there arent any word processing apps for android which allow multiple documents to be open side by side. Id bet its NOT an android limitation, as multiple internet browser tabs fit under the same concept(sorta) and probably take up much more memory than multiple text documents. its just an idea that i assume hasnt been ijmplemented yet. Id email the devs of whichever word processing app you use and ask them if its something theyd be interested in adding to their app. The only workaround i can think of for the time being, is to use two or more different word processing apps (for example polaris and quickoffice) simultaneously, and use the task switcher to go back and forth.
Just re-read ur post and saw you mentioned this...
MrGuy said:
At first, I thought it was something like the same application couldn't have 2 instances open at once as an OS limitation. However, it IS possible to have the same application with 2 different documents open at once but not without using multiple file managers (theres a vid on transformerforums demonstrating that if you open different files with the same app, but via different file managers, you can switch between multiple docs)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I guess that would be another work around, if it really works. that seems almost like a bug to me lol. Just wondering though, how would you switch between the documents if they are open in the same app? Would the task switcher show two instances of the same app open?
Okay, maybe not a "limitation" of the OS, more a "feature" where if you try and open the same application when its' already in the "recent items" it just restores the previous one from previous items rather than opening a new instance simultaneously.
Yeah, it's true, try it. If you have multiple file explorers (e.g. ES explorer and file manager) go into ES explorer, open up document1.doc in DocumentToGo (for example) and then open up file manager and open document2.doc in DocumentsToGo. It seems android opens DTG within the explorer/manager, so if you switch between the 2 different managers using the recent items, you can see DocumentsToGo open twice, once with doc1 and once with doc2. (I can't take credit for this btw, I made a similar request as to if its possible to open 2 docs at once on transformerforums and someone made a video showing that work around - I would post a link, but despite being a member/lurker here for over 5 years, I still can't be trusted)
I may just have to try and put my CS degree to some use and try make a tabbed word processor.
Thanks for the responses
Somewhat relevant to this... whatever happened to Onskreen? I thought they were trying to appeal to Google or something to get some real multitasking on tablets?

MTP / Media Storage issues –*need to deactivate indexing for one directory

Hi all,
I have a quite special issue. I hope someone here can help me or point me into the right direction.
Huawei P9 with Android 6.0, rooted.
For my purposes (*) I use a MicroSD card with 128MB capacity that contains a lot of small files (abt. 1.5 million files).
I wondered for weeks, why the phone becomes incredibly slow and hangs from time to time.
I learned that the Media Storage service could be responsible, because it tries to index all files and that can take a very long time if there are lots of files.
I deactivated Media Storage (using Titanium Backup) and BINGO! My phone is like new. Snappy, well usable.
Since I don't need MTP access to the phone, I thought it might be good now.
HOWEVER:
I just found out that ring tones don't work anymore, neither for phone ringing, nor for the alarm clock etc.
It seems that those apps also rely on the file index, that's gone now.
Without any ring or alarm tone, the phone is almost unusable again.
Do you know of any way to make the MTP / Mediastorage server ignore one directory when indexing? That would help, as I could simply let it ignore the directory on SD card that contains those 1.5 million files.
Or can you think of any other good solution for my problem?
Thank you so much!
Daniel
(*) to explain my usecase, why I need so many files on SD: I am a photographer, doing gigapixel panorama photography. For presenting my work to customers, I put my demo panoramic tours onto the SD card. These are HTML files with a data directory containing JPG tiles of the gigapixel panoramas. One panorama image consist of up to a few 100.000 files. A webserver running on the phone makes the panorama tours accessible to onboard browsers or, via WiFi hotspot, to other devices in the surrounding, e.g. a PC or tablet of the customer.
I considered solutions like an external storage (USB OTG) connected to the phone only when I present that stuff to the customer, or an entirely separate device (Pandora / Dragonbox Pyra or so) to host and serve the panorama tours, but I like to carry only one device, the small smart phone, to do it all. An extenal OSB OTG storage solution would almost fit my needs. But.. only almost, because a small storage is something that can get lost or stolen easily and that needs additional handling and provides additional points of failure, which I don't want to have in front of the customer.
Android is capable of doing it all, and my philosophy is, that a computer needs to adapt to my way of work than vice versa. This was the intention when Neumann and Zuse invented programmable computers. And I don't really want to eat humble pie here.
daniel908 said:
Hi all,
I have a quite special issue. I hope someone here can help me or point me into the right direction.
Huawei P9 with Android 6.0, rooted.
For my purposes (*) I use a MicroSD card with 128MB capacity that contains a lot of small files (abt. 1.5 million files).
I wondered for weeks, why the phone becomes incredibly slow and hangs from time to time.
I learned that the Media Storage service could be responsible, because it tries to index all files and that can take a very long time if there are lots of files.
I deactivated Media Storage (using Titanium Backup) and BINGO! My phone is like new. Snappy, well usable.
Since I don't need MTP access to the phone, I thought it might be good now.
HOWEVER:
I just found out that ring tones don't work anymore, neither for phone ringing, nor for the alarm clock etc.
It seems that those apps also rely on the file index, that's gone now.
Without any ring or alarm tone, the phone is almost unusable again.
Do you know of any way to make the MTP / Mediastorage server ignore one directory when indexing? That would help, as I could simply let it ignore the directory on SD card that contains those 1.5 million files.
Or can you think of any other good solution for my problem?
Thank you so much!
Daniel
(*) to explain my usecase, why I need so many files on SD: I am a photographer, doing gigapixel panorama photography. For presenting my work to customers, I put my demo panoramic tours onto the SD card. These are HTML files with a data directory containing JPG tiles of the gigapixel panoramas. One panorama image consist of up to a few 100.000 files. A webserver running on the phone makes the panorama tours accessible to onboard browsers or, via WiFi hotspot, to other devices in the surrounding, e.g. a PC or tablet of the customer.
I considered solutions like an external storage (USB OTG) connected to the phone only when I present that stuff to the customer, or an entirely separate device (Pandora / Dragonbox Pyra or so) to host and serve the panorama tours, but I like to carry only one device, the small smart phone, to do it all. An extenal OSB OTG storage solution would almost fit my needs. But.. only almost, because a small storage is something that can get lost or stolen easily and that needs additional handling and provides additional points of failure, which I don't want to have in front of the customer.
Android is capable of doing it all, and my philosophy is, that a computer needs to adapt to my way of work than vice versa. This was the intention when Neumann and Zuse invented programmable computers. And I don't really want to eat humble pie here.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There's an Xposed module that can do exactly what you're asking. But I'm not sure how nicely the xposed framework will work with your Huawei device (assuming you're still stock). You can check it out if you feel its worth any hassle that might be involved. Here's the link to the forum and a screenshot of the app's description & capabilities
https://forum.xda-developers.com/xposed/modules/xposed-xposed-media-scanner-optimizer-t2942609
GREAT! THANKS!
I didn't know that an XPosed module existed that could solve that problem.
An attempt to install XPosed a few months ago has failed.
But I retried today with the Wanam build (official one failed back then) and it worked well. Downloaded this module now and will see how it works.
Thank you so much!
Quick question:
The manual for the Media Scanner Optimizer module says
"Directories: If checked the media scanner will only scan directories that have a .scanMedia file (i.e. an empty file with a dot as first part of the name similar to the .noMedia file). Use a file explorer app to create this file. This file can be placed in a directory that may contain subdirectories. The subdirectories will be scanned as well. If unchecked all directories will be scanned (except for the ones containing a .noMedia file - this default behavior of the media scanner is not altered by the Xposed Media Scanner Optimizer)."
(source: http://repo.xposed.info/module/com.thomashofmann.xposed.mediascanneroptimizer)
Does that mean, in my case I coud simply have placed a .noMedia file in the directory with the millions of files and my problem would have been solved, even without XPosed?
Somewhere I read that the media storage service does NOT care about the .noMedia files, so I refused experimenting with this quite early in my research phase.
Do you have experiences, if this really works or not?
daniel908 said:
Quick question:
The manual for the Media Scanner Optimizer module says
"Directories: If checked the media scanner will only scan directories that have a .scanMedia file (i.e. an empty file with a dot as first part of the name similar to the .noMedia file). Use a file explorer app to create this file. This file can be placed in a directory that may contain subdirectories. The subdirectories will be scanned as well. If unchecked all directories will be scanned (except for the ones containing a .noMedia file - this default behavior of the media scanner is not altered by the Xposed Media Scanner Optimizer)."
(source: http://repo.xposed.info/module/com.thomashofmann.xposed.mediascanneroptimizer)
Does that mean, in my case I coud simply have placed a .noMedia file in the directory with the millions of files and my problem would have been solved, even without XPosed?
Somewhere I read that the media storage service does NOT care about the .noMedia files, so I refused experimenting with this quite early in my research phase.
Do you have experiences, if this really works or not?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I initially thought about the .nomedia alternative. But I wasn't clear on if the 1.5 million files you have were actually media files. If they are then creating a .nomedia file should do the trick. If not, then you have the Xposed module
I personally have a few .nomedia files here and there on my SD card. And it does what its supposed to, ie; stops any media file that's present in those folders from showing up in the Gallery/music player.
So I guess its safe to assume that they weren't indexed either
Freewander10 said:
I initially thought about the .nomedia alternative. But I wasn't clear on if the 1.5 million files you have were actually media files. If they are then creating a .nomedia file should do the trick. If not, then you have the Xposed module
I personally have a few .nomedia files here and there on my SD card. And it does what its supposed to, ie; stops any media file that's present in those folders from showing up in the Gallery/music player.
So I guess its safe to assume that they weren't indexed either
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I thought the .nomedia trick would only work, if the Xposed module was there?
Or does it work by default, even on a non-rooted stock ROM?
Thise mana files that I have are almost all JPG files. There are a few .js and .xml files, too, that control how the .jpgs are rendered on the client's browser, also some video files that are embedded into the virtual tours, but about 99.5% of the files are .jpg.
daniel908 said:
I thought the .nomedia trick would only work, if the Xposed module was there?
Or does it work by default, even on a non-rooted stock ROM?
Thise mana files that I have are almost all JPG files. There are a few .js and .xml files, too, that control how the .jpgs are rendered on the client's browser, also some video files that are embedded into the virtual tours, but about 99.5% of the files are .jpg.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It doesn't matter what type of files you have. If the folder has a .nomedia file, it will not be scanned for anything.
This is standard android behavior, and does not require xposed to be installed.

kindle RCE plugin, hidden files.

I saw this on my device, and only found little info/threads, with almost zero content/analysis. Aparently the kindle app leaves a bunch of random files around. And since the prefix is "RCE" i am a little paranoid, since that usually means "Remote code execution" and is usually associated with exploits
Files:
CS_JIT_Animation.mp4
jit_cs_positive_preview.png
rce_plugin_strings_resource_cs_CZ.json.min
rce_plugin_strings_resource_de_DE.json.min
rce_plugin_strings_resource_en_US.json.min
rce_plugin_strings_resource_es_ES.json.min
rce_plugin_strings_resource_fr_FR.json.min
rce_plugin_strings_resource_it_IT.json.min
rce_plugin_strings_resource_ja_JP.json.min
rce_plugin_strings_resource_nl_NL.json.min
rce_plugin_strings_resource_pt_BR.json.min
rce_plugin_strings_resource_v2_TYPO_TEST.json
rce_plugin_strings_resource_zh_CN.json.min
All Attached in a zip created by the android native file manager.
Current places mentioning this
https://forums.oneplus.com/threads/unkown-files-in-download.948860/
https://talk.sonymobile.com/t5/Xper...erious-Files-in-Downloads-Folder/td-p/1353185
https://forum.xda-developers.com/xperia-xz1/help/phone-mysterious-files-download-folder-t3871763
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMmx5tRm0jM (one of the files is a video, someone uploaded to youtube ...and to https://gfycat.com/generouspinkcolt
How to make those files appear for you:
Install kindle from the google app store
if you already have it installed, or want to see the files again after you deleted, Stop the app and delete all storage. (nothing will be lost, this app syncs everything and some more to the amazon servers)
perform the first Sync on kindle app
Now, insert a pen drive and open the native android File Mananger and look at the local Download folder
Files are somewhat hidden:
If you look into the download folder with any other app (I tried, blackberry file manager, oi file manager, Ghost Commander, and Termux --after enabling the storage setup)
Files probably have a weird attribute or ownership... but the native android file manager does not show anything other than creation date! And every single file operation (copy, move, compress) reset the information to "regular user, creation time set to now". So either I see them on the Native File Manager, without any information available, or I do not see the files until I destroy the information.
Android version is not important (seems to happen on several versions) and has been happening for a while (First mention seems to be Nov2018)
Anyone have any idea what this is? I know I will probably reverse eng the kindle app at some point, wast a bunch of time, and realize it is just some dumb amateur library badly implemented by amazon... or maybe not. I think at this point I am most curious as to how the app "hides" the files from most everything.

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