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.
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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

[Q] Nexus 7 - view emulated memory from pc?

Hello all,
i've found a little problem with my nexus 7 tablet and im wondering if im the only one or if this is a general thing:
Android 4.2.1 allows multiple users and gives these users some sort of emulated memory (which is a clone/shortcut to the 'real' storage(?)). When i connect my nexus to my computer and create a folder 'Document' and put a document 'Document1.docx' in there, i can see these on my tablets (using a file explorer and officesuite pro). This seems to work fine.
However, when i open officesuite pro, i see the files i would see on my computer, but when i create a new document 'document2.docx', and reconnect my nexus to my computer, it does NOT show up in Documents (nor anywhere else).
I think the following is happening: the emulated memory is a 'clone' of my normal sd card, so when i connect the nexus to the pc and create a folder in windows, it will get 'cloned' and therefor visible in the emulated memory assigned to me. However, when i go to the filemanager on the tablet the memory shows as emulated memory, and so when i save a document on the tablet it ends up in the emulated memory. And for some reason this emulated memory is NOT copied back to the main memory drive.
Can someone confirm this, or check if the same is happening to them? If not, does anyone have a solution to fix this? I would like to create documents on the tablet and be able to connect the tablet to the pc and see the files i created (yes i know google drive/dropbox is an easy option, but im wondering why this method is not working...).
Thanks in advance!
p.s. this is not just a problem that occurs with officesuite pro, this also happens with other applications (for example i dloaded an e-book reader that created a folder 'eBooks' which appeared in my emulated memory, but not when i connect the device to my pc). do you guys reckon the applications are to blame, that they might not be made for android 4.2.1 and therefor bug a bit (which would be pretty odd imo)? or is this an actual android thing, since my download actually DO appear on my pc.

Auto delete files!

I dnt know if anyone has the same problem with me.
I am using the Stock Rom .254 , with rooted, locked BL
I use the new 32GB Class10 Sandisk micro SD card 2 weeks ago
Then sth awful happened!
Last week, I connect my phone to the computer, and I am deleting some useless image file in the DCIM folder, suddenly, all the photos in my phone is disappeared!! And cant be found anymore.
And today, just several minutes ago, I connect my phone to the computer and delete files in the internal memory, suddenly it lags. I plug out from the computer. All the media files including music and photos are disappeared! (Last time only photo)
I dnt know what's going on so anyone can help?

Your Micro SD is corrupted.
Go buy another one.
(This can happen if you write a lot on the microSD, especially when using Chinese p2p streaming apps that downloads and uploads videos you watched e.g. Qvod, PPS, PPlive etc)
*These apps are legit apps, they pay regional copyright fees to copyright holders. (As long as you use it within /VPN to China)
This excludes Qvod though.
Try to avoid these apps.
One of the other app that can cause this is a Chinese novel downloader. It can download hundreds to thousands of files for just one book.
(1 file per chapter).
Simply avoid any apps that uses p2p downloading, and writes a lot.
Source: Happened to me once. After messing with Debian on a MicroSD for my Android tablet.

Internal/SD storage mess

Hi everyone,
I got the latest Moto X as soon as it went public because I loved the idea of Vanilla Android with SD support. I got the 16 GB version and a 64 GB SD. Ever since I got it, the phone has been bugging me about the storage and today I finally gave in. Until today I kept my photos, music and podcasts on my SD card but the internal memory was constantly full and I couldn't install new apps. So I thought formatting the SD card under Android 6 would make it one with the internal storage. It didn't. It made it worse. I can move apps to the SD card but I can't force photos and other media to be saved there. I was hoping for internal-SD continuity and I got a total lack of control. So now I can't receive SMS and I keep having "storage is running out" notification while I still have 60 GB free on my SD card.
What's your take on this? Thanks!

Since this is about SD cards, I'm having another problem to state if OP doesn't mind. On my Moto X, when using exploring (using file explorer) the original sd card I've used for years, many folders do not show up. The same happens to a video player (RockPlayer), where it doesn't show many folders I have on my card (it did when used on my previous Atrix 2). However, when I go to "Storage & USB" and select the card, everything is normal. That means, only when viewing the sd card via "Storage & USB", all folders appear.
However, applications and games (besides gallery) will assume the first situation, where those folders remain invisible. Does anyone know what the problem actually is?
Edit: After checking, it seems that my /sdcard folder is the same as /storage/emulated/0.
Thank you.

MoCML said:
Since this is about SD cards, I'm having another problem to state if OP doesn't mind. On my Moto X, when using exploring (using file explorer) the original sd card I've used for years, many folders do not show up. The same happens to a video player (RockPlayer), where it doesn't show many folders I have on my card (it did when used on my previous Atrix 2). However, when I go to "Storage & USB" and select the card, everything is normal. That means, only when viewing the sd card via "Storage & USB", all folders appear.
However, applications and games (besides gallery) will assume the first situation, where those folders remain invisible. Does anyone know what the problem actually is?
Edit: After checking, it seems that my /sdcard folder is the same as /storage/emulated/0.
Thank you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Seems like my sdcard folder is now C601-8353 under Storage folder, along with Emulated and Self folders.

domi_niku said:
Hi everyone,
I got the latest Moto X as soon as it went public because I loved the idea of Vanilla Android with SD support. I got the 16 GB version and a 64 GB SD. Ever since I got it, the phone has been bugging me about the storage and today I finally gave in. Until today I kept my photos, music and podcasts on my SD card but the internal memory was constantly full and I couldn't install new apps. So I thought formatting the SD card under Android 6 would make it one with the internal storage. It didn't. It made it worse. I can move apps to the SD card but I can't force photos and other media to be saved there. I was hoping for internal-SD continuity and I got a total lack of control. So now I can't receive SMS and I keep having "storage is running out" notification while I still have 60 GB free on my SD card.
What's your take on this? Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried using OpenCamera instead? It's free, open source, AND lets you choose where to store the pics. IMHO the picture quality is better too.
You could also move the pics to the card manually after you take them...

TXJim said:
Have you tried using OpenCamera instead? It's free, open source, AND lets you choose where to store the pics. IMHO the picture quality is better too.
You could also move the pics to the card manually after you take them...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Great call, thanks for the tip.

I haven't had any problems saving photos or other media to my SD card with adoptable storage. This is something you should be able to specify in preferences whether you are using adoptable storage or not. If this doesn't work with some apps just use a file manager to move the files to the SD card.
Sometimes when I move apps to my SD Card, I would get similar messages about being out of space, even though this wasn't the case. Deleting the cache on SD card seemed to fix the problem. There can also be a problem if your SD card is too slow. However, you would probably get an alert if that was the case.

My advise erase it all internal and sd card start from a blank state the phone should give you the option to mount the sd as internal I don't like how it is implemented so I chose not to use it.

For some strange reason my phone will not read my SD card I have it formatted to internal stage and now it says searching for SD card. I'm so mad I've searched all over with no solution, I'm about to get a new phone and scrap this one, sorry I'm just very upset and I had to vent, of anyone knows of this type of issue please share.
Sent from my SM-G935T using XDA-Developers mobile app

SAMSUNG GALAXY M30S DOES NOT RETAIN DATA ON THE SDCARD!

Hi All
I really need some help with this one - I have a M30S which is only a couple of years old and I have a problem with data - Mainly MUSIC - MP3 and also MUSIC VIDEOS -. Mp4's etc.
So, I downloaded the music and videos etc and then - Using File Manager Plus App (From Google PS) - I Move the files to the SDCARD.
2 THINGS - A) The Files I moved are simply not in the Folders I pasted them in to! The Newly created folders are still there - Just no files in them!
B) Less annoying but still not right - All files which are in the Downloads folder are still there - Whether I have MOVED, (or COPIED THEM). Also if I accidentally refresh the folder by scrolling down or up the screen ALL the files reappear - Including ones I have deleted earlier!
I have tried several different New SDCARDs and read information on the Samsung galaxy M30s on Samsung's site but none of it has been any help! I have tested the SDCARDs - Using "True SD CARD CAPACITY". The result shows that an SDCARD with a total storage of 512GB only has an available Capacity of 3GB - When there is no data over 1GB Max! Actually on the card!
Any ideas with be welcome!
Thanks for your help
J

Use only name brand cards like Sandisk Extreme bought from a known good source.
Format card in device. Leave it there and never use on another device. Never.
Toss the Gookill junk file manager first, then...
Use Samsung file manager to do all copy/paste operations.

Hi Blackhawk - Thanks for your help! The SD CARDs have been Good quality - San Disk, Kingston etc and all bought from totally trusted sellers and brand new - sealed products.
I have no problem with the internal storage - and the File Manager I use works absolutely fine with any other operation except when it is related to the SD CARD!
Sorry I just don't get it - I am going to format the card (but have done it before),
Then, I will use the Samsung File Manager to do some copying and pasting and see if it will work OK
Big thanks for your help and I will update here in case you want to know what happened!
Zoomclub - Jon

Zoomclub said:
Hi Blackhawk - Thanks for your help! The SD CARDs have been Good quality - San Disk, Kingston etc and all bought from totally trusted sellers and brand new - sealed products.
I have no problem with the internal storage - and the File Manager I use works absolutely fine with any other operation except when it is related to the SD CARD!
Sorry I just don't get it - I am going to format the card (but have done it before),
Then, I will use the Samsung File Manager to do some copying and pasting and see if it will work OK
Big thanks for your help and I will update here in case you want to know what happened!
Zoomclub - Jon
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're welcome. Scoped storage may be screwing with you. Common files like media should be ok but you may need to grant permission for it to work. Don't know as I specifically avoided using Android 11 and up.
Pie runs too good to mess with it. 10 is less friendly but usable.
I have a zero confidence level in all Google apps... they earned that.