Database Users

[Q] Limited access to external SD Card by some apps

Hi,
I've done a search and haven't been able to find anything solid on this so I apologize if it's been covered. I've been using the Atrix for a few days now and I noticed that when I view click on the "Files" app (the default file viewer that comes with the Atrix) it comes up with a list of the following options:
Internal phone storage
SD card
Shared folders
Protected Content
This is different than previous Android phones I've used in that I get a file structure instead of options of where to look. That's fine; I can just click on one of those options to view the contents. However, I use a application at work to use my phone as a glorified picture frame. It's called Slideshow Bob and it does not recognize the external SD Card. This hasn't been an issue with prior Android devices, but from little I can glean from doing an online search, this does seem to be a limitation with some Motorola models. Again, I have had no problem accessing my pictures in Slideshow Bob from any of the Samsung Android devices I own and this is my first Motorola phone with this OS so I'm wondering if this is a bug that will be remedied or if they've basically limited file access from apps on this phone. I'm sure that's not the case with every app, but it certainly is for some. Anyone else have any issues or workarounds they'd like to share?

iirc, none of the currently released Samsung Android devices have built-in storage plus an expansion slot, which is why you've likely never seen the issue.
Basically, Android was never designed to have more than one expansion slot, so that ends up being mounted in /mnt/sdcard (or /sdcard, with one symlinked to the other). Since there's no standard on where additional storage ends up being (and most programs assume there's no additional storage anyways), programs usually don't know where to look.

There is probably an option is Slideshow Bob of where to get the pictures, try /mnt/sdcard-ext/[folder name], where [folder name] is the name of the folder on the external sd card where the pictures are.

Sogarth said:
iirc, none of the currently released Samsung Android devices have built-in storage plus an expansion slot, which is why you've likely never seen the issue.
Basically, Android was never designed to have more than one expansion slot, so that ends up being mounted in /mnt/sdcard (or /sdcard, with one symlinked to the other). Since there's no standard on where additional storage ends up being (and most programs assume there's no additional storage anyways), programs usually don't know where to look.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi,
My Samsung Captivate had 16GB of built-in memory and an SD expansion card slot which I filled with an additional 16GB card. In the android file manager I could access the expansion card by going into the ext_sd (or something like that) under the main sdcard directory. I could also see this folder in Slideshow Bob.

harolds said:
There is probably an option is Slideshow Bob of where to get the pictures, try /mnt/sdcard-ext/[folder name], where [folder name] is the name of the folder on the external sd card where the pictures are.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi,
There is no such option. There is an option for the default folder, but it's a text field you have to type in, not a directory structure. I tried typing in the path to the external sd card, /sdcard-ext/MEDIA, directly (which ASTRO file manager shows exists), but the app says the directory does not exist. I really think Motorola is doing something to limit what apps can and cannot access for whatever reason. This has never been an issue with my Samsung Captivate or Galaxy Tab.

I think this actually has to do with the external sd card being mounted separate from the internal. In my previous devices the external card was seen as a directory on the internal sd card. With the Atrix it is an entirely separate item and some apps may not be able to access it as a result of having that different mounting. I don't have any other apps with which I need to navigate to a directory (other than various file managers) so I can't test how endemic this is. I imagine it might be an issue for apps that rely on a folder structure for data access such as music apps that are folder based instead of reading from what's in the media library.

I just tried another slideshow app. It is a problem, I think, with Slideshow Bob. It can't see any folders not on the internal sd card. In my Samsung devices the external card was viewed as a folder on the internal card and was, therefore, not a problem.

Apps having directory navigation problems on the Motorola Atrix
Kenny, I have the same problem with the PowerAmp app. My phone is also rooted and I have root explorer which shows me the music files exist. I can even play one file at a time with the power amp from explorer. But I get the same issue when I try to navigate to the music using poweramp. One more possibility is that the Atrix is running Android 2.2.1. Perhaps there is an issue with the upgrade. (I thing this "upgrade" is a disappointment compared to 2.2. I'd rather try Gingerbread.) AT&T has a 30 buyers remorse period and I've only had the Atrix for a week. I love the phone and I would hate to take it back but wtf? I'm just like the rest of you, I just want the damn thing to work!
p.s. My wife's Samsung Captivate never had this issue either.

Update: I found this issue in the Poweramp forum and I also spoke to an at&t support specialist and they verified what was said earlier about the problem is in the difference between the Atrix file system versus the Captivate. The Captivate mounts the external sd card as a folder inside the internal sd card while the Atrix has it mounted separately. The Poweramp administrators promise a fix in a week so I'm glad they are aware of the problem. This seems like an easy bug to fix. I will snoop around the market to see if an app can "trick" the Atrix file system to put the external sd in an internal sd folder. If anyone is aware of such an app, let us know.
The Atrix is promised the Gingerbread upgrade later this year. It has a new file system (ext4) which promises to be faster for phones like our Atrix or the Nexus. As I said, it seem an easy problem to fix, I'm sure this problem will be a thing of the past by then, I'm going to keep my Atrix and wait.
Kenny, you might want to check your app's web site to see if they have a fix in the making.

The Atrix being my first android phone im still learning things every day and I have had similar issues with the sd card and storage partitions. while checking out different files and what not I stumbled upon this default.prop file which contains the following..
#
# ADDITIONAL_DEFAULT_PROPERTIES
#
ro.secure=1
ro.allow.mock.location=0
ro.debuggable=0
persist.service.adb.enable=0
EXTERNAL_STORAGE_MOUNT=/mnt/sdcard
I was wondering if any one with more android experience is familiar with creating and editing prop files for certain activities could confirm if we switch the last line to sdcard-ext if this would now read or set our external sd card to be the sd card that the system and most apps read and write to. I haven't tested it myself but being familiar with different registry edits in winmo and windows im thinking this will work.. anyone agree or have some information they can share?
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App

What Android 3.1 DIDN'T Fix!

Still no sdcard slot!
Still no USB On-The-Go memory device support (we have USB joystick support but still no memory devices)
I haven't tried abusing the Camera Connection Kit yet to see if I can use a camera as a memory card reader.

scotty1024 said:
Still no sdcard slot!
Still no USB On-The-Go memory device support (we have USB joystick support but still no memory devices)
I haven't tried abusing the Camera Connection Kit yet to see if I can use a camera as a memory card reader.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The SD card is a motorola issue, not a google issue. This has been pointed out in many, many forums.

what about Linux connection via usb. Can anyone confirm if this has been fixed?

vBulletin typing (like XDA) still sucks.

timrock said:
what about Linux connection via usb. Can anyone confirm if this has been fixed?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's never been a problem. 3.x and higher use MTP so they can stop using FAT32 for internal storage. Linux does MTP just fine. What are you talking about?

jdclucidly said:
It's never been a problem. 3.x and higher use MTP so they can stop using FAT32 for internal storage. Linux does MTP just fine. What are you talking about?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
why was this method needed? Xoom will not show up as a drive, unless you do this. Where as with the Droid X, once plugged in, it showed up as a drive. I hope this makes sense.

timrock said:
why was this method needed? Xoom will not show up as a drive, unless you do this. Where as with the Droid X, once plugged in, it showed up as a drive. I hope this makes sense.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
USB Mass Storage is the old method and it shows up as a drive. The Droid X is older than the Xoom therefore it is using USB Mass Storage.
MTP is Media Transfer Protocol and is the method used by 3.0 and higher.
How is it that you're using Linux and you don't understand this stuff?

jdclucidly said:
USB Mass Storage is the old method and it shows up as a drive. The Droid X is older than the Xoom therefore it is using USB Mass Storage.
MTP is Media Transfer Protocol and is the method used by 3.0 and higher.
How is it that you're using Linux and you don't understand this stuff?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
really? you cant just answer the question? maybe im new to linux. maybe im dual booting. If you dont want to answer, don't. No need to for the rude responses.

slack04 said:
The SD card is a motorola issue, not a google issue. This has been pointed out in many, many forums.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmmm, from Android Honeycomb 3.1 Details ...
...Android 3.1 still isn’t intended, at the operating system level, for managing external storage devices. This detail, which came out in conversations I had with Google engineers today, explains why the Android file system organization is, well, a mess...
“We don’t want to expose the user to file locations,” explained Hiroshi Lockheimer, director of engineering at Google. “How do you manage that as a user? The not-good answer is with the file browser.” Lockheimer says that many of the experiences I’ve seen so far are what individual hardware manufacturers have enabled, as opposed to what Google has provided natively. The good thing is that Lockheimer says Google is looking at ways to do this; but the problem hasn’t been solved yet...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

I still dont understand why they havent added (or, in fact, have removed) the "clear all" button in notifications. If I download more than 2 files it really annoys me. (I'm OCD about unchecked notifications)

timrock said:
really? you cant just answer the question? maybe im new to linux. maybe im dual booting. If you dont want to answer, don't. No need to for the rude responses.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
He did answer you. The xoom uses mtp which will not show up as a drive in Linux unlike older android which used mass storage. Mtp allows you to add files with out having to unmount the file system on the xoom. There are many threads on how to set mtp up. If you're new to Linux it may seem hard to do but its simple. Do a Google search for mounting xoom Ubuntu and you should find them easy.

Just-in-time said:
He did answer you. The xoom uses mtp which will not show up as a drive in Linux unlike older android which used mass storage. Mtp allows you to add files with out having to unmount the file system on the xoom. There are many threads on how to set mtp up. If you're new to Linux it may seem hard to do but its simple. Do a Google search for mounting xoom Ubuntu and you should find them easy.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you. And i meant answer without the snide remark. Thanks again for explaining.
Sent from my Xoom using Tapatalk

i know just what you mean, however i quite enjoy having the (X)s to click to get rid of them. I would like to see a slide to delete in the notifications aswell

Dubar said:
I still dont understand why they havent added (or, in fact, have removed) the "clear all" button in notifications. If I download more than 2 files it really annoys me. (I'm OCD about unchecked notifications)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
totally agree. there are lots of things i understand why they're waiting, but this? come on. i could clear all on my phone.

I just want to clear up a misconception about MTP. It is not a cross platform solution for transferring files.
My post from another thread on the subject:
I can mount my Xoom in linux using libmtp and mtpfs, however, it's slow, kludgy, and generally feels like it will flake out at any moment. Additionally, even when it's mounted, I can't seem to copy music across properly; it doesn't keep the folder structure. In fact, the directories are created and any non audio files are copied across fine, but every mp3/audio file is flatly dropped into the Music directory.
I tried to copy some music onto it from my fiancee's windows xp laptop and it worked ok (though the album art didn't appear).
The move away from mass storage to MTP is a massive disappointment for me. Mass storage has always been a big selling point for me when purchasing a device and for Google to switch to using a Windows specific protocol and consider it cross platform is a big letdown. MTP on mac requires a special app and on linux, support is dire, certainly for anything more complex than simply pulling images from a camera.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can just about get files onto the xoom, but I can't load music onto it; all of my mp3s just land up in the top level of the Music directory, regardless of how I attempt to transfer the files. I think transferring a zip file of the music and unzipping from within a file manager on the xoom might do the trick, but this isn't a good, workable solution. I understand the reasoning behind MTP, but it most certainly isn't cross platform and shouldn't be mentioned as a working solution by Google.
Hopefully people will soon realise not to keep insisting that the xoom has linux support when using MTP.

New update for drag racing is really choppy, lile playing angry birds on a g1.... but samauri II and the other thd games run smooth...dont kmow if its 3.1 kernel cuz it plays fine on my mytouch4g
XOOM

slack04 said:
The SD card is a motorola issue, not a google issue. This has been pointed out in many, many forums.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If that is a motorola problem and xoom is a barebone system. Who's gonna fix it, how?

stevebakh said:
I just want to clear up a misconception about MTP. It is not a cross platform solution for transferring files.
My post from another thread on the subject:
I can just about get files onto the xoom, but I can't load music onto it; all of my mp3s just land up in the top level of the Music directory, regardless of how I attempt to transfer the files. I think transferring a zip file of the music and unzipping from within a file manager on the xoom might do the trick, but this isn't a good, workable solution. I understand the reasoning behind MTP, but it most certainly isn't cross platform and shouldn't be mentioned as a working solution by Google.
Hopefully people will soon realise not to keep insisting that the xoom has linux support when using MTP.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Change all the extension names in the song file name to .mp and it will allow the transfer
Then use something of your liking, I use astro file manager, and just add the 3 on the a tail end of the extension.
Its a b, but you can at least get a couple good songs on there.

stevebakh said:
I just want to clear up a misconception about MTP. It is not a cross platform solution for transferring files.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're right, it's a cross-platform solution for transferring MEDIA, being the Media Transfer Protocol.
It's smart enough to detect the media files that it supports and put them in the right place. I prefer it over the old way, I hated having to unmount the sdcard every single time.
A poorly made Linux MTP library doesn't make it not cross-platform. It's an open standard for transferring media to USB devices.
It's not perfect, but it's great for a device like the Xoom where unmounting the internal memory is not desirable.
Honestly users get really confused by all of the extra directories when mounting an android sd-card anyways.

slack04 said:
The SD card is a motorola issue, not a google issue. This has been pointed out in many, many forums.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually, it has been a big debate on rather it is Google's or Moto's issue, but I am sure that we all can agree that it needs to be fixed no mater whos issue it is.

sdcard function on 3.2

I picked up a xoom wifi 10.1 recently, and first thing out of the box when it had net access was grab the 3.2 update. This was great as far as I could tell and so far the tablet has been excellent.
I ran into a sort-of glitch though. Although the apps I have on it function just fine for the most part, a couple of them (connectbot in this case) won't read from the /sdcard or /mnt/sdcard paths when trying to import a key file.
This is significant because those two locations aren't actually any sort of SD card - they are internal memory (which apparently connectbot can tell), and when I added an SD card it got put up under /mnt/external1 and never gets used by the system or applications.
So how do I transition from having the xoom's internal 32gb NOT be on the /sdcard path and make it so that my sdcard gets used properly? I haven't had it long enough to really build up any critical amount of data worth keeping, so if it takes a factory reset to do it then so be it. I was just hoping for a more graceful/less-destructive way to do it.
TIA

Not sure how this would work Stock.
I ordered an SD Card for mine so will have to wait for it to get in. Personally, I have no issues using the internal 32GB "SD" as primary since I would only want the add-on SD Card to be a backup location for things I don't want to lose.
I'll mess with it when an SD Card comes in and see if I can help.

I'm going to submit a bug report to connectbot, maybe it's their issue (aka - not quite fully functional on honeycomb) and not the xoom's. I'd still appreciate anybody's input on this though.

App developers are going to have to fix the compatability for their own apps.

tigerknight said:
I'm going to submit a bug report to connectbot, maybe it's their issue (aka - not quite fully functional on honeycomb) and not the xoom's. I'd still appreciate anybody's input on this though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
From what I've read its read only through the Xoom. Write access only works when connected to your computer. From my experience that seems to be exactly what it is. Why is it read only is my question? Better than nothing and if I find its annoying I will root and use Tiamat for full access.
I think the guy who mentioned the path is onto something though. The internal storage is "sdcard" which made sense when there wasn't one. Now that there is, it would seem that the path needs to be changed somehow. Wonder why that wasnt modified with the 3.2 update? Maybe because there would be no way to copy the data if the path was changed and it would break all of the current programs? That would make sense to me?
We wouldn't mind some simple instructions to move the data after the path is changed, but for the mass market its probably not a viable option.
These are just my thoughts as I drink my morning coffee.
Sent from my Xoom using XDA Premium App

Low phone storage

So suddenly I got the new market and with it like thousand of updates.
Problem is now I'm constantly running on low phone space.
All apps left that can not be moved to the SD-Card are a must have.
So deleting them is not an option
Except the ones that I can not uninstall (like Google Books) guess because they came preinstalled.
I can't even install some new apps as they require more space then I obviously have.
What are my options?

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=670087

Move apps to SD (non-root and no apps required on phone)
I just did this yesterday with my Nexus One...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1001202

Read the FAQ, question 9.

I can not do this as I run a stock rom I think.

SocalVisor said:
I just did this yesterday with my Nexus One...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1001202
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
DarsVaeda said:
I can not do this as I run a stock rom I think.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you read?
From what I can tell, you do not need root to do this, just a working ADB connection. No additional on-phone software is required.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Given your parameters, only solution is to partition your SD card, create an ext-flavored filesystem on one of the partitions, and run one of the available software solutions (referenced in the links above) to permit saving of ALL apps and app data (and dalvik cache) on the SD card.
If you do that, cheers to you, but do some critical thinking and research before buying into the Class 10 hype. Most benchmarks have shown that the bottleneck in the N1 SD read/write speed is not the speed of the card, but rather the combination of software and hardware that handles SD card input and output. In fact, on some benchmarks, Class 4 cards perform as well as Class 6 and Class 10, and in some, Class 10 cards underperform Class 4 (which may have to do with the different standards applicable to Class 10 versus 2,4, and 6...the older cards had to meet a certain minimum read/write speed on a fragmented card for a single large file transfer; for Class 10 the specification is sequential writes on a defragmented SD card -- if you ask me both specifications are insufficient...how about a spec that tests sequential operations on a fragmented card?).
Or, alternately, consider removing some apps. Unless you are a developer, I can't see that you "need" to have more apps than the admittedly meager flash allocation can handle. You may want them, and want them very badly, but I've always found that a self-critical distinction between needs and wants makes me happiest in the long run, because it's easy to ignore wants. If this doesn't work for you, look above. Whatever floats your submarine, man.

I never had any problems with the sd-card performance.
Doesn't matter anyway as my problem is that there are 9gigs of free space on the card but I fear I will soon run into the problem of being unable to install any more apps (even to the card) as the phone space is too low.
This actually happens already now when updating apps.
Unfortunatly I did not manage to get the adb thing working yet so I can not test SocialVisors solution.

I'm unrooted as well, and have this problem as well. I'm hoping the nexus prime hits soon enough (and on tmo).
Otherwise, I'll look into rooting (which I'd rather do, if I'm going to modify, I'll go all in), I think one of the benefits is being able to uninstall unwanted stock apps and keep them off. So like the amazon mp3 store, for instance.

Okay so I now managed to get ADB working.
I could move some heavy apps like swype. I could not move "Astrid Tasks" as then the widget does not work anymore. Hopefully that is the only app.
I am now back at 30MB free space.
But still there are some hughe apps, like Google Maps(11MB), that can not be moved at all.
And yes, Google Maps is a must have!

Did you read the FAQ?
Did you read rallyemax's answer, and put attention to the first paragraph?
Are you looking for a solution, or do you just want to complain?

tkirton said:
How to install:
NOTE: ROMS THAT ARE ORM (ORIGINAL ROM FROM MANUFACTURER...ALSO KNOWN AS STOCK ROMS) WILL NOT RUN ANY VERSION OF APPS2SD EXCEPT FROYO.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I alread said I run a stock rom (not froyo).
The only one who is complaining is you.
You can just ignore this thread if you don't like it.
But thanks to everyone so far.

In that case, it's simple: you can't do a thing.
Your 2 options are:
1) Run a custom kernel over your stock ROM, or a custom ROM, and install A2SD support. Need to root / unlock the bootloader / hack the bootloader, of course.
2) Do nothing and don't look for solutions that don't exist, just accept the fact that you're stuck with less internal storage that you wanted.
No third option.

[n00b Guide] - Fire for Christmas ::for Kids::

I've spent the past 3 weeks pretty solid working out how I want to transform the 3 Fire's I got for $35 for my boys, 10, 8, and 4. I figure I'd post where I've finally landed along with some other things I've tried both with success and failure, and hopefully save some people some effort. I'd suggest reading through this before you use it as a stepbystep guide to make sure this works for you. I apologize if it's a bit jumbled, but everything should be here for you to convert your Fire. Again, I'd suggest reading through the whole thing to come up with a plan of action for you.
Goal: Turn this Fire into a glorified gameboy, used ONLY by kids, not shared with parent(s) and child
On 5.1.1
Assuming you've purchased an SD card, you will want to repartition in preparation for moving files and content.
Pointers for this:
Make two partitions, 1 which is about 70% of the card formatted as Fat32, must be a PRIMARY partition.
Second partition will be the remaining space, make it ext2, must be a PRIMARY partition. (From what I can tell the reason people suggest using ext2, and not 3 or 4, is because with 3 and 4 there is some built in backup and recovery operations which is great for when you're running a full Linux operating system, but for our purposes all it does is cause more writes which in THEORY will shorten the life of your SD card)
I formatted the Fat32 partition as the first partition, and the EXT partition as the 2nd. Not sure if the order matters or not, but I've had no problems doing it this way thus far.
Reference: http://rootmyandroid.org/increase-internal-memory-phone.html/
Reference: http://rootmyandroid.org/how-to-use-link2sd-tutorial-guide.html/
Note:
During initial setup, don't bother with multiple user profiles (reasons explained later).
Using root junky's super tool (Thanks root junky, you made this all possible!!! http://rootjunkysdl.com/?device=Amazon Fire 5th gen&folder=SuperTool) do the following:
Root
Prevent OTA
Install Google Play
Install NovaLauncher (this is important if you're not going to use the built in Kids Mode in FireOS)
In Google Play Store download the following:
Link2SD (This is assuming you've purchased an SD card)
Kids Place - The VERY SIMPLE reason I went with using this app (which essentially becomes an alternative launcher) instead of using the built in FireOS's profiles and kids mode, is because the built in kids mode will ONLY allow you to use apps which you've downloaded FROM the AMAZON app store. I understand why they do it this way, I mean, the whole point of the fire is to keep you inside the Amazon ecosystem after all. But, I have MANY games I've paid full price for on Google Play that are appropriate for my kids. Since I can't put them into the kids profile built into the FireOS (If anyone can link me to a guide which is different, I'd love to hear about it) I couldn't use the built in stuff. In addition, the built in kids mode really is a pretty awesome feature on the fire, but the icons are freaking huge and kind of a waste of space.... going with this alternative method of Kids Place gives you smaller icons therefore you can "shove" more icons on a single view. Icons which take up half the screen are great, but if you're a dad like me who's going a little overboard and putting 100+ games on these things, it'll be a bit of a pain to scroll through them for your kids using the built in profile in the OS.
Note:
You can get Link2SD from the Amazon app store, but the version there is older than what's in Google Play and ultimately didn't work. Once I got the Google Play version, worked like a champ. NOTEx2: For whatever reason (this was frustrating for me to figure out), even though I partitioned 70% of the 64GB Samsung microSD to Fat32, and the other 30% I partitioned to ext2 (BTW I did the Fat32 first and ext2 second... not really sure if it matters the order or not but that's what worked first time for me so I went with it), when I launched Link2SD and it asked me which partition to use, I had to choose ext4 for it to finally work. Choosing both ext2 and Fat32 would both result in basically it saying: "yeah, you chose the wrong one punk" (or whatever it says).
Kids Place - similar to the one above, there is weirdness in the version on Amazon vs Google Play. On Amazon it actually claims the version there is slightly newer than Google Play, but when I'd launch apps on the one I got from Amazon it would kill the WiFi for that app. I realize that this is a built in option into Kids Place, being able to choose WiFi on or off per app (which is really cool), but the one from Amazon seemed to do it when and how it wanted instead of what I was telling it to do. Google Play's version had no such problems.
(( A word of caution using Link2SD's "feature" of being able to "Link Internal Data". DON'T DO IT. I've not been burned HARD CORE by it. The symptom is that if you POWER DOWN, and POWER ON the tablet, Apps go missing. Through reading and troubleshooting, it appears via this forum (http://androidforums.com/threads/link2sd-missing-apps-after-reboot.858565/) that the culprit is when you choose the Link2SD option to "Link Internal Data" to the SD Card. There's even a nifty batch way to enable it on ALL apps. Well, after powering off and powering back on the tablet (after I was COMPLETELY done putting on 150 games), when it came back up I only had like 15 apps on it. Everything else was POOF, gone. I've noticed sometimes after a power cycle like that the apps might take a few moments to 'come alive', but even after 15 minutes of waiting I had nada. Went in search and found I'm not the only one. I've now since completely redone (including reformatting the SD Card) all 3 Fire's and so far after multiple reboots, I've not lost a single app. So for now at least, this does seem to be the problem ))
You will need to spend the $2.35 on Link2SD Plus (striking out due to my caution above, that being said I'm glad I threw this guy $2.35 because my tablet would basically be worthless without the app), and after you install Kids Place, you'll need to upgrade to premium for $4.99. Here's why:
Link2SD - Plus - This is what allows you to automatically move files and content to the SD card when an app is installed. This is mega important to me because that piddly 5.x GB of usable space gets eaten up ridiculously fast otherwise. Dive into the settings once you have plus, and just go turn everything on. Auto move everything. Be sure to go into all menus and sub menus.
Kids Place - The premium features is key for me. For example: A) You can make this app launch upon reboot, thus it basically "forces" this into a kid only/friendly device. If your kids are sneaky, or bored, they'll try to break out of Kids Place. Then they'll delete apps, make folders, sabotage they're brothers devices, etc. B) You can change the name that's displayed on top from "Kids Place", to something else like their name, give them a fun nickname, whatever. For my 10 year old he won't feel like it's just a little kid thing. C) You can do this part without premium, but it's critical for me to mention it: You can change what the home "button" does so that it directs you back to Kids Place instead of the regular home launcher. The reason you need to install NovaLauncher above is because if you still have the stock firelauncher, you can NOT replace the home button with another launcher otherwise. [Word of caution, if you enable the 'background' premium feature, Kids Place is still running, just more in the background. Took me a few minutes to figure out that's what I had done. I kept thing something was wrong and wondering when whenever I launched Kids Place it kept asking me if I want to shut it down or go into settings.... it's because it was running the whole time already)
Once you've done all that, simply download apps (Amazon Underground still seems too good to be true, but I'm hopeful), sideload apps, get apps from Google Play, then go into the Kids Place settings and choose which apps you want (Manage Apps).
Other things worth noting:
SlimRom. So, this is cool. It's fast, and pretty awesome. For me however, at the end of the day, it didn't make sense to introduce something in addition that could go wrong. If you're like me and you have no intention of using this device yourself and you ONLY want this to be a device for your kids, I don't think SlimRom is worth putting in. If it's a shared device, it might be worth it. The only thing I really forgot to test when I had put SlimRom on one of the devices was how the Amazon App store would work, and whether or not the device would be recognized properly with the Amazon Underground portion.
That's it, I hope you find this helpful. I welcome any feedback or suggestions on how to make this a more gooder guide for anyone like myself who's first jump into amazon tablets has been these fires. They truly are AMAZING devices for the price.

hobojester said:
The only thing I really forgot to test when I had put SlimRom on one of the devices was how the Amazon App store would work, and whether or not the device would be recognized properly with the Amazon Underground portion.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Seems pretty comprehensive guide for those using it the same way, very nice work
And when I had Slim on it worked fine with my amazon app store and underground apps. And the music and video ones for that matter. I couldn't get the kindle app to show my books but someone solved that by using older apk after I went back to stock.

@hobojester, THANKS so much for posting.
I purchased the $35 Fire Tablet for my 3 girls (9, 7, 5).
I've rooted at 5.0.1 and disabled OTA, disabled ads, Installed GooglePlay store, and loaded Nova launcher. Although I haven't taken it another few steps with Kids Place, I feel that I'll start with just locking down and hiding the apps via Nova Launcher will be enough for now. My kids are pretty savvy at navigating interfaces and even when they touch/exit an app, they know how to get back to it. I know there are holes with settings and NovaLauncher settings so when they figure them out, they can reenable certain functionality.
I'll look into Kids Place though, that might be my next step.
Also, about the whole SD card partitioning, I've installed a 32GB card and the tablet stated that it would start using the card as the default storage device. I'm guessing your method moves EVERYTHING to the card, and the default behavior for the Fire Tablet is to install some things on internal memory and 'other' storage is routed to the card? I've installed quite a bit of applications since I plugged in my SD card and it doesn't seem to be full... although I didn't check the storage stats before I wrapped the tablets.
Also, I've heard some good press on the Circle (with Disney) router, so I did order one for the home as yet another piece of the parenting puzzle:
[edit] sorry, didn't have sufficient permissions to post outside links. Google up: "Circle router with Disney"

Pond-life said:
Seems pretty comprehensive guide for those using it the same way, very nice work
And when I had Slim on it worked fine with my amazon app store and underground apps. And the music and video ones for that matter. I couldn't get the kindle app to show my books but someone solved that by using older apk after I went back to stock.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good to know about Slim and the Amazon store. Again, if I were going to use the tablet in a 'shared' environment where I'm using it AND my kids are using it, I'd totally use Slim. It was awesome. In this particular instance where this $35 device is a glorified gameboy, Slim is just something that is an extra layer of complexity that's really not needed and *could* get in the way. I have no intention of my kids even getting on the internet with this device. Not until there's a real need, and even then, I'd probably go get the K9 browser and use that.
TheTruthKC said:
@hobojester, THANKS so much for posting.
I purchased the $35 Fire Tablet for my 3 girls (9, 7, 5).
I've rooted at 5.0.1 and disabled OTA, disabled ads, Installed GooglePlay store, and loaded Nova launcher. Although I haven't taken it another few steps with Kids Place, I feel that I'll start with just locking down and hiding the apps via Nova Launcher will be enough for now. My kids are pretty savvy at navigating interfaces and even when they touch/exit an app, they know how to get back to it. I know there are holes with settings and NovaLauncher settings so when they figure them out, they can reenable certain functionality.
I'll look into Kids Place though, that might be my next step.
Also, about the whole SD card partitioning, I've installed a 32GB card and the tablet stated that it would start using the card as the default storage device. I'm guessing your method moves EVERYTHING to the card, and the default behavior for the Fire Tablet is to install some things on internal memory and 'other' storage is routed to the card? I've installed quite a bit of applications since I plugged in my SD card and it doesn't seem to be full... although I didn't check the storage stats before I wrapped the tablets.
Also, I've heard some good press on the Circle (with Disney) router, so I did order one for the home as yet another piece of the parenting puzzle:
[edit] sorry, didn't have sufficient permissions to post outside links. Google up: "Circle router with Disney"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Glad you can find this useful.
As far as the storage card piece, you are correct in that "my" method moves EVERYTHING. Some apps are "self contained" as I like to think of it, when you download it. Popular games like Geometry Dash have everything contained in the downloaded app (or the .APK file). That is just the app itself. You can tell the OS to auto put the "app" on the storage card, and that works out great, but it's a little misleading. The problem comes in when you have games like Knights of the Old Republic. That app itself is something like 40 MB or what not, but after you launch the app, it'll download this extra content, which in this particular case is 2 GB. The kicker: it'll ONLY store that "content" (as I call it) into what the device considers "External Storage", which is ACTUALLY on the INTERNAL storage. That whole emulated SDcard business Android does. It's all funky. For fear of sounding like a commercial, Link2SD fixes all of that. Linux (what Android is built off of (oh, and hi iPhone users, so is iOS for the record)) has this thing called "Symbolic Links". You can google it up more about it, but think of it as an uber shortcut. You create a symbolic link on internal storage to the actual physical SD card, and the program THINKS it's writing to internal storage when in fact it's writing to the SD card. The kicker: you can only create symbolic links if you're rooted. The nice thing about Link2SD, is that it'll symbolic link EVERYTHING. The "app", the "content", and all of the saved game data and what not (which take a game like MineCraft, can get pretty big if your kids (like mine) go crazy building worlds). And you can have it to it all automagically. But you will need to pop that SDCard out, put it in your computer, and get it re-partitioned (visit the links I posted in the original guide for more in depth details).
I have heard really cool things about the Disney router. For now, my kids don't really have any need (or business) getting on the internet unsupervised. When they do, I'll probably give them the K9 browser.

Sorry for the questions but I can't figure it out, searching doesn't find it, and I'm trying to get these wrapped.
Do I need to still select Fire OS" install supported apps to sd". Or do I do it all with LInk2DS? I haven't Rom'd these yet and I probably won't until we get back from vacation. They are only rooted with stock rom. I also don't need to do the whole kids place thing as my kids are a little older...Thanks for taking the time to write this all up!
Also I have partitions shown in my Disk usage app that are named "External", "SDcard1", system and "SD Card". I know "SD Card" is the exfat 2 part I made base on the size, but as for the "external" and SDcard1, they are both roughly 5 gb ( my sd was only 8 gigs so I made the FAT 32 5 gigs and the rest the exfat 2. But now I am not sure of the naming and I can't tell based only on size. So, is "External" really the built in amazon storage, and "sdcard1" is my microsd?

Like your thinking.
How are you getting past the "Apps with usage access" request for Kids Place?

howzitnow said:
Sorry for the questions but I can't figure it out, searching doesn't find it, and I'm trying to get these wrapped.
Do I need to still select Fire OS" install supported apps to sd". Or do I do it all with LInk2DS? I haven't Rom'd these yet and I probably won't until we get back from vacation. They are only rooted with stock rom. I also don't need to do the whole kids place thing as my kids are a little older...Thanks for taking the time to write this all up!
Also I have partitions shown in my Disk usage app that are named "External", "SDcard1", system and "SD Card". I know "SD Card" is the exfat 2 part I made base on the size, but as for the "external" and SDcard1, they are both roughly 5 gb ( my sd was only 8 gigs so I made the FAT 32 5 gigs and the rest the exfat 2. But now I am not sure of the naming and I can't tell based only on size. So, is "External" really the built in amazon storage, and "sdcard1" is my microsd?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This will be a good chance for me to point out (I'll edit the guide in a second): DO NOT LINK "INTERNAL" Data via Link2SD. It has caused apps to disappear and never come back. I actually had to start completely over on all there of my devices. That "option" to Link the Internal Data is only available when you purchase the Plus version of Link2SD, DON'T CHOOSE THAT OPTION!!!
Now, with that out of the way, Link2SD is clever in how it works, and I am barely out of the n00b stage on this so I'll give a disclaimer that I may be totally feeding you false information here, but here's how I understand it: First of all, what I did was leave the SD card settings inside the OS all 'defaults', which installs the "App" to the SD Card. Now with that, I believe what happens is Link2SD intercepts that 'transfer' and puts the actual apps on the EXT partition. There is the incredibly critical option in Link2SD to put all other data (except "internal" data of course) on the SD Card. That's what moves the really big parts of those big games and apps. So when the App is relocated, it's put onto that EXT part and the Content on your FAT32 part. To address your question regarding External, SDCard#, and 'where in the heck is the EXT' part.... the EXT partition is mounted and 'located' under the 'local' storage under something like the /data/sdex2 folder. Welcome to the world of Linux... on a computer Linux (if my really old dusty Linux knowledge still works) when you need to access the CD drive you have to MOUNT it, and than LINK that mount to basically a local folder (something like /MNT/CDROM). Your EXT partition is mounted the same way as a folder, and for whatever reason in an app like ES File Explorer you won't see it as another drive, you'll only see the FAT32 drive. Maybe that has something to do with it being FAT32, I'm not sure. ...... the long point here is that Link2SD intercepts or coordinates with the OS's moving of apps to locate the App data to your EXT partition (mounted to that /data/xxxxx folder) and all the other really big stuff to the FAT32 partition. Again, I may be way off here, but hey, makes sense in my brain right now .
Inside of Link2SD there's an option in the menu to see the storage consumption, and THERE it'll actually show you the EXT partition as well as the FAT32 partition.
If my kids were a little older and I truly didn't care about them mucking around in settings, potentially deleting things etc., I'd probably give SlimRom a go for that. I've been messing around with it some more and it is just simply more 'pure' Android OS so it'd give the more 'true' Android experience.... if you really care .

cogito808 said:
Like your thinking.
How are you getting past the "Apps with usage access" request for Kids Place?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not, simply because FireOS doesn't have that option. I just have to hit 'Cancel' and move on. If you were to put on SlimRom you'd have that option. From what I can tell the biggest thing we're missing out on by staying on FireOS and not having this option would be limiting time in Kids Place for certain apps and what not. For me personally, I'll just set a timer, but if it's something you want to use, I'd absolutely suggest putting SlimRom on there and then basically following the rest of the guide. Everything still applies.

If anyone cares, I set up SlimLP for my mom who is a bit less technologically advanced than I am and I put smart launcher on the device and just hid the apps I thought would be bad if she were to accidentally open them and not know what she was doing. (I thought his could be useful for some of the people here as well)

How do I avoid using the "Link Internal Data" feature? I do not see this option anywhere in the App.
Edit: OK. found it. I was looking in settings (before moving anything) but once I move an app the options come up.

chemie99 said:
How do I avoid using the "Link Internal Data" feature? I do not see this option anywhere in the App.
Edit: OK. found it. I was looking in settings (before moving anything) but once I move an app the options come up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, I found out the hard way how bad this can be.... like... 6pm on the 24th, type of thing, RIGHT when I had finished it all up. I had some kind of heavenly help nudge me into thinking "you should turn these off completely, and simulate Christmas morning, see how long it'll take to fully boot back up".... and you can imagine my stomach drop when I went from having 150 games down to something like 3... it was painful. So, yeah, avoid that setting AT ALL COSTS!

How do you partition the SD card on the tablet? Also is this worth doing when you can install xposed SD card modules and be able to move obb files
Sent from my KFFOWI using Tapatalk

just wondering on the reason for 70/30 FAT32/EXT2. What gets installed in each partition?

tonyt3rry said:
How do you partition the SD card on the tablet? Also is this worth doing when you can install xposed SD card modules and be able to move obb files
Sent from my KFFOWI using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I"m not familiar with the xposed SD card modules so I can't help there. As far as HOW you do it, I linked to some articles in the first post that might help (Reference: http://rootmyandroid.org/increase-in...ry-phone.html/
Reference: http://rootmyandroid.org/how-to-use-...al-guide.html/)

chemie99 said:
just wondering on the reason for 70/30 FAT32/EXT2. What gets installed in each partition?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Basically the "app" gets installed to the 30% EXT2, and allt he "content" goes tot he 70% FAST32. Content will typically be data that gets downloaded after the app is installed. Take Knights Of The Old Republic for example, the "app" is like 50MB, but the "content" which gets downloaded upon the first time launching the actual program, is 2GB.

An Alternative Solution
I also gave my kids 3 Fire tablets for Christmas. My kids are mostly older (12,11,4) and the older two have had other Android devices. I went a different direction from the OP, which I'll discuss here for posterity's sake. This is a bit harder than the OP's method but ends up with a more conventional Android environment.
As background, I used FireOS on the Fire Phone for a few weeks, and ran into many problems. I installed CM11 on the Fire Phone and bought another in the final sale. You can read about that on the Fire Phone forum if you're interested.
Also, I've used Screen Time Parental Control for a couple years now, and while somewhat expensive it's great for monitoring without being too invasive. I can let the kids have a lot of freedom with their devices, without having to be worried about them either being on them all the time, or doing weird things. Screen Time nominally works with FireOS but in the end I did not use the tablets as-is long enough to try installing it.
For these tablets, I decided the easiest path was to install CM12. This avoided waiting for Amazon for security updates, and any FireOS incompatibilities, as I'd experienced with the Fire Phone. Also, the kids are familiar with CM, and frankly any replacement Android device will be easier in the future. After my experience with the zombie Fire Phone from Amazon I'm less concerned about CM/ggow/XDA bugs than I am Amazon's.
I decided to create separate user accounts for each child, as opposed to having both my Google account and the child's Google account** under a single user. I've done this before, but it's awkward to have to switch between accounts when using Gmail/Hangouts/Drive/etc., and sometimes things get mixed up.
Thus, for each of the three tablets I went through this process:
[I don't have the tablets in front of me, so if one of these steps doesn't seem obvious ask and I'll look up the exact names/buttons.]
1) Install CM12 using the well-documented methods
2) Boot into CM
3) Configure for my primary Google account
- Download interesting applications that have been purchased on my account
- Open SuperSU, enable multi-user access
- Open Contacts, select "ME", change name to "Dad" (or whatever)*
- Open File Manager
- Settings / Enable multi user access
- Open main Settings app:
- Set screen lock / PIN
- Users / Add user / OK / Set up now
4) "Switching to new user"
- Google Launcher always
- Log in with the "child's" account** in the wizard
- Open Contacts, change "ME" to the child's name
- Open File Manager
- Settings / Switch to Root access mode
- Browse to /data/app/
- Change into interesting packages and pick the .apk file
- Select "Install"***
- Repeat as necessary
Here I installed Screen Time Parental Control from the Play Store and went through the steps for Child device. Also any customization for the account should go here, then you can switch back to your regular user.
To switch user, drag down the system tray, pick the head image in the top right corner, and then the appropriate name.
Notes:
* This is in a wacky place, but this contact is how CM identifies the user name to display in the switch screen. If you don't see "ME" don't add it, just browse around; it's there somewhere.
** Apparently Google only allows accounts for people >=13. Thus, if you are reading from Google, know that these are my own accounts and my children happen to use them.
*** This will actually not re-download the application, but it makes a temporary copy while installing. Application user data is always separate between users, but for the most part download data is shared. For most applications things work on either user; however, Electronic Arts applications don't work with separate users, and Terraria will print an error (but still worked once the core data was downloaded with my purchasing account). I'm sure there are other apps that roll their own security and will be in this situation, but out of a very large family library these are the only apps with which I've had trouble.
Finally, a last note that Screen Time does not presently block creating new users from the system tray. In theory a youngling could create a user that would not have Screen Time limits, but then they wouldn't be able to delete it without getting in to Settings, which you should block anyway. Depends how devious your children are; for me I'm just waiting until they figure it out to do anything about it... just keep an eye on it if you go this route.
Hopefully this helps someone, eventually!
Best,
Tim

I got two fire tablets for the kids for Xmas, one is the kids edition (with the 1yr of apps,etc) the other is a standard fire. Used root junkies tool on both to block lock screen ads and OTA and hide Apps. They were both running OK, occasionally have the odd situation where you try to open an app and it looks like it is reloading it or redownloading it, not sure if this is because internal space has ran out and its redownloading on the fly but its quite frustrating.
Decided to flash slim LP rom on the standard tablet as there were apps that weren't available(better choice on play store and it wasn't tied into the 1year subscription).
So glad I did, was pretty straight forward to get it up and running and the latest build is so solid, fast and stable, was expecting it to be a bit quicker than fire OS as it had a lot less bloat but it seriously impressed me. So I have kids place set up on it to control apps and play time. I also installed hilocker from the play store to help simplify/lock down the lock screen. For example you can disable the status bar in kids place,but the child is still able to turn the screen off and on, they can then access the pull down toggles and mess with things, but with hilocker you can disable it which is great. Battery life is just as great if not better and your also up to date with all Google's security patches to boot.
It is a very good value tablet, as its just been reduced to just £40 in the UK. One thing that would be a major improvement is I just wished they had put 16GB of storage instead of 8GB. I know it has the sd card option which is great but in reality you only get around 5GB of actual internal storage for apps, a lot of which can't be moved to the sd card or still take up internal space when they are. Again I can't recommend slim rom enough as it really makes a big difference to the tablet (besides providing full play store access) and makes it perfect for consuming media, browsing, or just handier for when you want to use a bigger screen than your phone.
Sent from my InFocus M810t using Tapatalk

gsmyth said:
One thing that would be a major improvement is I just wished they had put 16GB of storage instead of 8GB. I know it has the sd card option which is great but in reality you only get around 5GB of actual internal storage for apps, a lot of which can't be moved to the sd card or still take up internal space when they are.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
@gsmyth, look into Link2SD if you haven't already. Between that and a 32GB MicroSD I don't feel especially constrained by the 8GB onboard.

tdcrone said:
@gsmyth, look into Link2SD if you haven't already. Between that and a 32GB MicroSD I don't feel especially constrained by the 8GB onboard.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How are you formatting your 2nd partition for links2sd?. I keep getting 'unable to mount' error, trying to setup as ext4, which I thought was the standard on newer hardware. I believe I tried ext 2 as well. Without 2nd partition obb and data stay on internal. Thanks

I wish to thank the OP for this, as I am trying to use, and bought the recommended apps... haven;t had the time to set this all up, and it gets a little confusing having all these other devices, but eventually I'll get it.