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Should I have a directoy "~/android_storage/Music"? [answered]

asked 2014-12-20 13:26:45 +0300

ossi1967 gravatar image

updated 2014-12-20 13:43:28 +0300

I tried to find out why the integration of Android media in the stock media player and gallery just doesn't work at all. While doing some investigations, I found out something strange. Tracker is set up to scan the following Android directories:

  • /home/nemo/android_storage/DCIM
  • /home/nemo/android_storage/Download
  • /home/nemo/android_storage/Pictures
  • /home/nemo/android_storage/Podcasts
  • /home/nemo/android_storage/Music

This seems like a sensible way to include, say, music or images from Android apps to the tracker database. In theory. On my phone, however, most of these directories don't exist inside ~/android_storage/. I'm missing:

  • /home/nemo/android_storage/Pictures
  • /home/nemo/android_storage/Podcasts
  • /home/nemo/android_storage/Music

(Download and DCIM are there.)

Also, the article [TechSpecs] Android on Jolla phone lists directories under ~/android_storage/ that just aren't there on my phone.

So my questions are:

  1. Should I see these directories on my phone? Or are they missing on all Alien Dalvik installations?
  2. If they should be there - can I just manually add them so they'll survive a re-start of the Android subsystem?
  3. If they aren't meant to be there - why is Tracker configured to scan them?
  4. And finally: From an Android PoV, are those directories special somehow? Does it make a difference for Android? Like: Would music applications automatically choose ~/android_storage/Music as their download directory should it be available? Or is it just a directory like any other? (Just asking because these directories get a special mention as "Medias Directories" in [TechSpecs] Android on Jolla phone )
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The question has been closed for the following reason "the question is answered, an answer was accepted" by ossi1967
close date 2014-12-21 13:49:48.456035

1 Answer

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answered 2014-12-20 14:06:40 +0300

simo gravatar image

updated 2014-12-21 14:26:27 +0300

  1. These directories are created for the first time when there's a need for them. For example a Music folder should be there after downloading a music file using an Android app.
  2. You can
  3. ^
  4. ^ yes

Quoted from the comments below, contributing even more to the answer (adding Amazon- and 7digital-downloaded music into the tracked folders on Jolla). You can copy the red text, and paste it into Jolla terminal or via SSH connection as a normal user, no devel-su needed:

Mhm... OK, I was brave and gave it a try. I wrote (as normal user):

dconf write /org/freedesktop/tracker/miner/files/index-recursive-directories "['&DESKTOP', '&DOCUMENTS', '&DOWNLOAD', '&MUSIC', '&PICTURES', '&VIDEOS', '/home/nemo/android_storage/DCIM', '/home/nemo/android_storage/Download', '/home/nemo/android_storage/Pictures', '/home/nemo/android_storage/Podcasts', '/home/nemo/android_storage/Music', '/home/nemo/android_storage/amazonmp3', '/home/nemo/android_storage/7digital/Track' ]"

Worked. Tracker now reads music from both 7digital and Amazon. It's not something I'd like to do too often (how long can command lines get?), but at last it works now. I'll close this question as I now know ~/android_storage/Music doesn't necessarily need to exist. Thank you all for your input!

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Thank you, but this makes it even more mysterious. As I said, the reason why I looked into the issue in the first place was that music downloaded from Android apps did not show up in the media player (=are not indexed by tracker). Now you say these music downloads should have triggered the creation of ~/android_storage/Music where the files should have been stored. Instead, they're in the respective applications' private directories. Is this a problem with Alien Dalvik or with Amazon Music and 7Digital?

ossi1967 ( 2014-12-20 15:36:40 +0300 )edit

What happens is you do create the directory manually in advance and then download another song with the same app?

simo ( 2014-12-20 17:07:18 +0300 )edit
2

Amazon Music stores it's files in an own folder named amazonmp3, as the developer did not want other apps to see them, You should use their own player in their opinion. I tried to solve that using a symlink: https://together.jolla.com/question/43832/music-player-does-not-follow-symlinks-after-reboot/

balta ( 2014-12-20 17:11:35 +0300 )edit

Great comment @balta - I wonder how difficult is it to add the actual folder into the tracker instead of a symlink to a tracked folder?

simo ( 2014-12-20 17:20:27 +0300 )edit

@balta: Thx for the confirmation about Amazon music not going to ~/android_storage/Music - so it's a feature, not a bug. :) (I assume 7digital follows the same "logic".)

Creating symlinks to Amazon and 7digital was one of the first things I tried, but it only worked for the one music file I had in the Amazon directory at the time the symlink was created. I probably re-booted afterwards (cannot remember) or whatever... Whatever is added to the directories now is ignored. Symlinks would be the easiest way, I guess, if they'd only work.

ossi1967 ( 2014-12-20 18:17:03 +0300 )edit

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Asked: 2014-12-20 13:26:45 +0300

Seen: 867 times

Last updated: Dec 21 '14