Return original path instead of android uri scheme

[selankon]

Hi,

Here from elrepo.io!

We asked for add the option to return absolute file path instead of a cached copy on #12 .

The problem now is that it return the absolute file path in Android URI scheme, like:

content://com.android.providers.media.documents/document/image%3A2355

Could you implement to get the file path in a "unix like" path format in order to don't use another plugin to translate it?

Thanks in advance

[kinex]

Hi, That is not possible unless you set OpenFileDialogParams.copyFileToCacheDir to true. Picked file may locate e.g. on Google Drive or on other storage provider so "absolute path" is not available. If you have different information please reopen with more details.

[selankon]

It seem that the absolute_path plugin can retrieve this information

[kinex]

It seems to copy the file to a cache dir at least in some cases. What is your use case, why do you need this?

[selankon]

We are working on elrepo.io, this is related to #12 .

The use case is we share on our "F2F backend" a file: the user select a file, and this filepath is passed to our backend to share it over the f2f network. This backend, called RetroShare, don't understand Android Uri scheme, so we have to pass the absolute file path.

We don't want to create a cached file to do not waste phone space, we want to access directly to the file.

[kinex]

Have you tried using that other plugin, does it give you the path you need?

If user picks a file e.g. from Google Drive, is the file physically present on user's device yet? If not, you cannot have an absolute path to it? Or are you expecting to get a file URL pointing to the file at Google Drive?

And even if you have an absolute path to a file located on user's device, have you tested that you can access the file in Android using the absolute file path? I think there might be some OS restrictions which prevent you from accessing the file with an absolute path (especially in the latest Android versions).

[selankon]

Hi,

We need the local path, what mean that we only want to pick local files. If we create params like:

final params = fileDialog.OpenFileDialogParams(
                    localOnly: true,
                    copyFileToCacheDir: false
                  );

The localOnly option is supposed to return local files only right? So we can have the absolute path from them, isn't it?

[selankon]

As commented here, the plugin flutter_absolute_path: ^1.0.6 makes our app crash without error message.

[selankon]

Hi,

Just to know, the option localOnly: true should return only local files (not those on the cloud)?

Thanks

[kinex]

Yes it should return local files only.

[selankon]

So setting localOnly: true with copyFileToCacheDir: false could return the absolute path. Are you going to support this? Otherwise I have to find another way to retrieve the absolute path.

Thanks in advance!

[kinex]

So what do you do with the absolute path? Do you want to for example read the file? Have you tested that reading a file with an absolute path is possible or does Android security features prevent it?

It could be supported if the absolute path is really useful, but only in that case. But I have not investigated is it possible to get the absolute path and how is it done. I am quite busy so I recommend a PR if possible.

[selankon]

So what do you do with the absolute path?

Read the file from the file system to share it in our app. As is an application to share content, we don't want to create a copy on the file system because the devices have a limited storage.

Have you tested that reading a file with an absolute path is possible or does Android security features prevent it?

On Android 10/Q if you add y the following lines you can read the file from the storage:

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.READ_EXTERNAL_STORAGE"/>
   <application
        android:requestLegacyExternalStorage="true"
    >

What do you think if I write a PR where, if localOnly: true and copyFileToCacheDir: false return the absolute path?

[kinex]

Thanks for the details. Then it makes sense. Please write a PR.