Develop Reference

Hide pdf and .mp4 files in Android

I'm developing an app that downloads .pdf and .mp4 files from a server. I'm saving this files on my SD card.
I need to hide these files to only be visible from my app.
Can someone help me?
Thanks!
Best regards.

Create a folder with a folder name starting with '.' (dot) and save files in this folder,it usually works on all linux versions and android

Best practice is to use internal storage. files saved to the internal storage are private to your application and other applications cannot access them. When the user uninstalls your application, these files are removed.

Create folder like this
File rootPath = getBaseContext().getDir("Yourfoldername", Context.MODE_PRIVATE);
if (!rootPath.isFile()) {
rootPath.mkdir();
}
File file = new File(rootPath, "sample.pdf");

Create a folder and Inside folder save your file with '.' before File name and save files, it will work on all versions of android

How to acces the data of root folder(/) of an android device?

I'm storing the DB file to the path /data/data/somefolder/ in my application. I want to get the file from this folder in my system or in my device so that I can view the content in it. I'm able to pull the file from emulator, but I'm not able to get the file from device. Is there any app which can do this?
PS: Programatically I'm able to access the file

You can see that Here to get the "/data/data/somefolder/" directory with getExternalStorageDirectory() method
While inserting and retrieving you path you have to store fullpath to get solve out your problem.
EDITED : AFAIK its not possible to access internal data but you can create your same folder in external directory for future Use and access it when you required.
If you want to Access it from device then you can also create Folder at path "sdcard/YOUR_APPLICATION/XYZ/" location with Full path location in database.

You can store file in internal storage so there is need to specify path from root. simply you can write/ create file like: File f= new File("myfile.txt");
and use it as you want. and it will not visible to other apps so its most secure.
If you still want to store on external storage like micro SDCard or phones built in storage then please try following:
File root = new File("/");
get all the folders from root
String[] folders = root.list();
and use one of them as you want.
or
Use above mentioned methods like getExternalStorageDirectory().......

It is easy, when the device is rooted. If not you can still get the file when your app is built in debug mode. Try on your development machine
adb shell
and then on the device
run-as your.package.name
cd databases
cat your.db.file > /sdcard/your.db.file
and then you can copy it from your sd card.

Android, how to choose save file location?

is there any solution how to choose the saving files location?
maybe with the original file browser, to choose the destination?
thank you!

All you need is Android Directory Picker

Better to save files with your app namespace:
String extStorage = Environment.getExternalStorageState();
path = extStorage+"/Android/data/com.mydomain.myapp/";
It will be deleted when app gets uninstalled.
Here is actually everything about data storing.
http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/data/data-storage.html
From the above link:
If you're using API Level 7 or lower, use
getExternalStorageDirectory(), to open a File representing the
root of the external storage. You should then write your data in the
following directory:
/Android/data/<package_name>/files/

It's probably easiest and expected to save this out to the dedicated area on the external SD card.
You can get this folder by calling
file://localhost/Applications/android-sdk-macosx/docs/reference/android/os/Environment.html#getExternalStoragePublicDirectory(java.lang.String)
File path = Environment.getExternalStoragePublicDirectory(
Environment.DIRECTORY_PICTURES)
You can also append a sub-folder to reference the source better ie. your app.
You can either choose DIRECTORY_PICTURES or DIRECTORY_MOVIES. If it's user created I'd probably stick to pictures.
To be helpful you can also call the media scanner to add it to the appropriate content provider system wide.
sendBroadcast( new Intent(Intent.ACTION_MEDIA_MOUNTED,
Uri.parse("file://" + Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory()))
);
If you MUST get a file chooser going, which isn't the recomened approach to expose the user to the file system. Try the file chooser form Open Intents. http://www.openintents.org/en/node/164

How to set folder permission to read only in android [duplicate]

I want to create a folder in sdcard in an android device and I want to set a folder permission for the creating folder. The folder permission should be that from only from my application this folder should be assessable. No other application should be able to access this folder. Is there any method to create this. Please provide any valid link for this.

sadly it is not possible to create read-only permissions for the sdcard. This is a part of Android's system design and won't be changed soon.

I am making an application in android and I want to make a ready only folder in sdcard.
This is not possible, sorry.

FAT32, the standard SD card file system, does not support file permissions. This means that any file is world readable and world writeable.

String SaveFolder = "/Ready";
String extStorageDirectory = Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory().toString();
File myFolder = new File(extStorageDirectory + Folder);
myFolder.mkdir();
This is a code to make a folder, and just like Tim said: it is not possible to create read-only permissions folder.

As others have said, you can't for the reasons specified.
I'm not exactly sure what you are trying to accomplish, but if you want to create a private file that can't be accessed by other apps, you can create in your app's "data" directory, by doing this,
OutputStream os = context.createFileOutput("myfile.ext", Context.MODE_PRIVATE);
Note that this is not the SD card, it's internal storage, so you aren't going to be able to create a very large file.

how can I copy files to the file system of android?

How can I copy files to the file system (place) in android? How can I access it?

copy files from android to local
adb pull /data/data/com.example.sample ./sample/
copy file to android from local
adb push ./sample/ /sdcard/sample/

I'm not sure if this is what you're asking, but here's another interpretation of your question:
You can place files in the assets folder in the project on your development machine. They will be bundled into the apk file and then access them through the AssetManager class. Something like this from within a Service or Activity class:
AssetManager am = getAssets();
InputStream is = am.open("filename");
This will allow you to read the contents of those files. I don't believe you can write to them though. There are other options for if you need to read and write files in your application's storage sandbox. This is done by calling openFileOutput(). I should note though that the user can always access the files on the device through ddms but other applications won't be able to access files stored in your application's storage sandbox.
Edit Based on your comment, you probably want to use
OutputStream out = openFileOutput("outfile");
to write to a file from your code. This code must be called from within an Activity or Service (something that extends Context). This file will be stored on the phone's file system and not on the sdcard. These files will not be accessible to the average user. If users know how to enable usb debugging then they will be able to access them and there is really no way around this.

You can use:
Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory()
That will give you /sdcard if your device has an sdcard, or something different in other cases. For example the Archos.

I took some time to research about android's system files earlier, but almost always with android x86, i found out that the /system folder inside android is read-only,
it is an image with format is SFS format, this is read-only image format of linux so i don't think you can copy some thing inside this folder. I not sure about rooted android. Hope it will help you.

You can probably hide your file in the sdcard by prefixing it with a dot (ex: .myfile)