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Jolla device as an drive viewable on Windows

asked 2015-09-24 18:25:54 +0200

Snakedog gravatar image

Neverless connecting the Jolla Phone via USB to windows creates often troubles. One big effort for excachning data independent from cloud services would be, to improve the Interface for the USB connection, which shows the Jolla devices as an drive volume. This function would really be an added value, as still not everybody is using Cloud services ( beacuse they are not safe as Sailfish OS is).

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The ease (or lack thereof) of transferring files and data isn't just a problem for Windows, and Jolla needs to greatly improve on this to make the phone more usable for ordinary non-techie people, eg, see also:

dave ( 2015-09-24 18:44:45 +0200 )edit

Various techniques exist for PC/Jolla data exchange. One of them, quite simple: Filezilla ftp client (or anything similar). Works well over USB or WLAN.

I wouldn't recommend full direct access to phone contents from computer like a Windows, Linux or iOs volume. sFTP uses phone owner's credentials. Much less dangerous, specially if you authenticate as "nemo", not "root" (except for back-up from phone to PC).

objectifnul ( 2015-09-24 19:12:45 +0200 )edit

I take this as Jolla showing up in Explorer as a device is not enough, am I right? If I am not mistaken, MTP is supported in Vista and newer. If you want to get data transfer beyond that, say hello to SCP...

Personally, I don't understand why Jolla shows up as a MTP (?) device instead of removable mass media, but I can easily transfer pics and documents using just USB cable - satisfies me...

Direc ( 2015-09-24 22:08:39 +0200 )edit
5

@Direc :

why Jolla shows up as a MTP device instead of removable mass media

Because Sailfish doesn't use FAT32/NTFS/exFAT as a partition format but BTRFS, which Windows and Mac OS X are pretty much incapable of reading anyway. Removable mass media would be completely useless for everybody except Linux users.

Also, jolla phones don't use a separate partition for user data. Exposing the whole phone root partition with full access to the desktop OS (specially a virus-laden one like Windows) is not a very secure idea. Something bad could really easily happen.

Last-but-not least: most filesystem (with the exception of special one designed for computing clusters) can't be mounted by several OS at the same time and risk corruption. So to make it available as a USB mass device, a smartphone needs to hibernate all applications, unmount the data partition, expose-it over USB. Then after use: remount-it, and restart all applications.

Instead, on of the solution used by Jolla phones is MTP: a protocol that shares only files and directories (and not the full partition) over USB. (Think of it as a network share, but over USB cable instead over network). Sailfish OS remains in charge of the file access and on-drive partition. Much more secure and less prone to corruption. That also alows simultaneous access to data by the smartphone and the desktop, both at the same time.

MTP is the poor man's (read:Windows user's) substitute for SCP/SFTP/RSYNC.

Of course using something like fuse's sshfs or KDE's sftp kio-slave is even better. But that requires having a unix-ish OS (Linux, Mac OS X, etc.) on the desktop.

DrYak ( 2015-09-24 23:38:54 +0200 )edit

@dave: if you actually tracked the thread you refer too you would have noticed this : https://together.jolla.com/question/282/usb-file-transfer-support-for-mac-os-x/?answer=105226#post-id-105226

@Snakedog: what is your problem?

Philippe De Swert ( 2015-09-25 12:35:43 +0200 )edit

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-1

answered 2015-09-25 12:10:00 +0200

Snakedog gravatar image

Already exchanging Picture, Videos and Music would be nice ;) In my opinion there are two variants. 1. Make the Jolla device accessable as drive which is possible with Linux based devices 2. Add an PC software ( analog to other manufacturers ) to exchange picture, videos and music and backup the Sailfish device

I'm aware to use SCp programs, but for the final user there should be an easier way to access and exchange with the Jolla device

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For the usage you described, no extra software is needed. In Settings/USB, select "PC Connection". Connect your Jolla and your PC with an USB cable. In Explorer, open "Sailfish" and browse "Phone Memory" or "SD Card". Difficult to make it more simple. (Windows 7) SCREENSHOT

objectifnul ( 2015-09-25 12:29:09 +0200 )edit

What about windows share ( https://openrepos.net/content/v10lator/samba ) ? It doesn't get any simpler than "be in the same network" and it even works with Windows older than Vista. ;)

V10lator ( 2015-09-25 12:57:06 +0200 )edit

@V10lator that's why: https://together.jolla.com/question/109029/11928-slow-sshscprsync-when-screen-is-off/ Samba takes a lot of ressources even while not in use and thus the battery wouldn't last very long. You can however still install samba and play with it if you like, just don't expect any magic to happen while you do ;)

Shoppinguin ( 2015-09-25 14:05:38 +0200 )edit

@Shoppinguin Use charger or USB cable and the problem is none-existent (in fact you should even be able to use samba over USB but I never tested that).

It does? I'm using it (always on) since before it was released at openrepos and my battery drain is just like before. Neither smbd nor nmbd are shown as using any CPU power in top (or Lighthouse). ps aux shows:

[nemo@Jolla ~]$ ps aux | grep -e smbd -e nmbd
root       985  0.0  0.1  16600  1192 ?        Ss   09:37   0:00 /usr/sbin/nmbd -F
root      1014  0.0  0.1  25196   984 ?        Ss   09:37   0:01 /usr/sbin/smbd
root      1025  0.0  0.1  25720  1060 ?        S    09:37   0:00 /usr/sbin/smbd
nemo      4263  1.0  0.0   5588   772 pts/0    S+   13:11   0:00 grep -e smbd -e nmbd

Which translates to 0.0% CPU and 0.3% RAM. I wouldn't call that "lot of ressources". ;)

//EDIT: BTW: If you really have resource issues with samba please give me a bug report at openrepos so we can investigate what's wrong.

V10lator ( 2015-09-25 14:16:24 +0200 )edit

@V10lator i will check up on this, thx. probably i got the config wrong or whatsoever. Maybe Windows 10 bombards the device with queries 'n' stuff. However, as mentionend in that other thread, connecting my Jolla to a charger does not disable the sleep state and thus does not improve on performance. Weird things are going on...

Shoppinguin ( 2015-09-25 14:37:52 +0200 )edit
-1

answered 2015-09-25 17:49:42 +0200

Snakedog gravatar image

Perkele, This is why i opened this topic! Connecting the Jolla device with windows is not this easy! Please Jolla improve this functionality to make it easier without using any 3rd Party software!

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Uh, isn't this a duplicate of a lot of questions? Like, there are so many questions asking for the same thing allready

jollailija ( 2015-09-25 20:02:01 +0200 )edit
1

@Snakedog: Have you read the first answer? Plug in USB, select pc suite. How hard is that? I guess it can't be made easier. So if that is not working you would have to tell what the issue is.

Philippe De Swert ( 2015-09-25 23:05:51 +0200 )edit

Issue is that nothing shows up on my windows 7. Driver installation fails because they don't exist. take it back. It was all reason of a faulty USB hub

tatuj ( 2015-09-26 12:25:54 +0200 )edit

Yes i tried it out with just PlugIn it and it didn't worked at all, i also tried out other several stuff like adding the missing MTP drivers to windows --> Result Device Manger regiognizes an MTP device, but it didn't become viewable on Windows Explorer as an on device "Sailfish" ! https://together.jolla.com/question/2565/windows-drivers-for-jolla-usb/ Since then all 3 computers have the sam behavior when connecting the Jolla device via USB!

Snakedog ( 2015-09-26 18:15:27 +0200 )edit

Probably not the problem, but easy to check: some (very) cheap USB cables have only power wires (for battery charge) and no data transfer capability. Try with an other cable.

objectifnul ( 2015-09-26 20:35:06 +0200 )edit
-1

answered 2015-09-25 23:08:47 +0200

pan tau gravatar image

https://together.jolla.com/question/10002/alternative-to-mtp-usb-mass-storage/?answer=43463#post-id-43463

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It would be nice if Jolla spent some time improving this topic on an next Update Release! Could be that this is just an Issue with Windows 64bit version, just a bad feeling from my stomache

Snakedog ( 2015-09-26 18:18:19 +0200 )edit
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Asked: 2015-09-24 18:25:54 +0200

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Last updated: Sep 25 '15