Only because IPv6 and self-hosting are not mainstream yet. But if it were commonplace for everyone's home to have something as simple as a public file server or SSH server, then this problem would be trivialized.
I haven't been able to get Syncthing permissions to work. The frustrating thing for me with Android has always been inconsistencies between vendors and weird permissions issues.
It is alright, but SFTP transfer broke for me some time ago. I think it is related to changes in Android, but surprisingly there were not a lot of posts about this issue last I searched. Using Android 13 / Samsung One UI 5.1 with Windows 11.
I use Material Files (from f-droid) as my default file manager, which includes support for mounting FTP, SFTP, SMB, and webdav shares. It doesn't handle the connection getting interrupted very well, so if that happens i have to restart the app. Other than that it's been working great for my SMB share.
It's pretty good. Definitely better then self-hosted stuff like nextcloud, because you don't need to maintain your own server. But sometimes it takes a while for two hosts to discover each other on the same local area network.
I think they're both good for different use-cases. I use nextcloud myself on a truenas system. I sync things like my pictures to nextcloud, and delete them from my phone after I've sorted them into the correct folders.
This way my data isn't clogging up my phone and other things, is still available from anywhere (as long as my home internet doesn't go down), and it's still safely stored on redundant storage.
This does take a bit more setting up than something like syncthing, though it wasn't very difficult at all. Basically install the docker image, tell it where my data goes, and set up a new dns record if you want it publicly accessible. I personally run it through a zerotier network so I don't have to do that.
The amount of times sending myself an email is still the quickest thing is insane. Sure I could try to use notion or keep to send myself some random string of text but am I logged in on my desktop? Idk. Just use email.
Also there are so many things like air drop, nfc, etc, but so many of them are so specific to certain devices. Maybe one day we'll figure this out lol
For phone-to-computer it works fine. But double-sided boi will still win if you need to send files to a dumber device like a printer -- those don't typically support MTP or whatever iphones use. Unless you have an ancient android phone that gives full block-level access to the internal storage/microsd card through usb cable lol. I really miss that feature.
Can you not just plug your phone into your computer, and then use your computer's file manager to drag it from your phone to your computer? It's this not a thing anymore?
remember when it was somehow trendy to take a picture with snapchat and the screenshot it to it shows the tools on right and post that on instagram? that shit was stupid as hell
I still do that all the time. I work with a bunch of different computers and it's easier than sending a file or writing the info down.
I get that there's device to device file transfers, but it's slower, and other employees would undoubtedly fill my phone with garbage screenshots, if not virus furry porn.
Quite a few of the usual memory device manufacturers make drives that have a Type A USB plug on one end, and either Micro USB or Type C on the other. They're specifically meant for one end to easily plug into your PC, and the other end to go into your phone. Not, obviously, both at the same time.
Can you not just plug your phone into your computer, and then use your computer’s file manager to drag it from your phone to your computer?
That's right, you cannot. Well, sometimes you can. MTP is quite an unreliable technology, at least for Linux users. Sometimes you'll plug in a device and it'll work fine, other times it won't even show up.
P.S. and yes I have enabled MTP on the android device
Idk
I just plugged my pixel into my Ubuntu laptop, and tapped on the USB charging notification on my phone, selected "more options" and changed the selection from "no data transfer" to "move files".
Then my Ubuntu file viewer could see all my files. Or at least a lot of them.
Except that if you connect your phone to a computer using USB, it will transfer files using MTP and it's pain in the ass, as it's slow and unreliable. Sending files over Bluetooth is better (but not much) over using USB connection.
Outside of regular simple-command remotes I only ever used IR data transfer between my PC and Nokia 3650 (bcs the proprietary connector had shitty contacts).
And it was slower than any of other methods previously listed.
(I don't actually remember, but less than 100kbps I think, about half the theoretical max iirc, some of which was the phone and the memory cards fault too)
I used localsend on desktop, laptop and my phones to sync stuffs between OSes and phones. What I likes is that it support multiplatform out of the box and works flawlessly between Windows, Android and Linux distros (tried both on Ubuntu, and LM without problem). It's just SHAREit without any stupid weird stuffs on it.
Syncthing ftw. As soon as I plug my phone into a charger, it starts syncing everything to my NAS. Even if it's not charging, I can override the rule and force it to sync.
I don't even need a double-sided boi because my dumb ass got lucky enough to pick a cheapo laptop with a USB-C port. The little sandisk drive is probably one my best investments into the phone besides the case.
KDE connect only works painlessly on phones that allow you to use your files... As weird as it is, that's not most of them.
But you can still move them around somehow and force it to work. Also, the same works for syncthing. USB drivers haven't been the easiest option for a while.
Someone pointed out it's actually a usb stick with two different ends, which sounds pretty neat. I also thought it was like a cable without the actual cable part so your phone would just be dangling there awkwardly
The USB Type-C is useful for sharing files offline between smartphones while the USB Type-A is useful when you want to backup files to a PC at some point.
One thing that really got me while working on computers and networking right as LAN networks became a thing in the late 90s and early 2K years was.... I'm connected to this switch, and so are they. Why do I need to burn a CD/use an external hard drive (later a flash drive), to move data?
Took me a while to figure out SMB/cifs, and when I did .... Game changer. Since then I've also learned all I can about storage, networking and file sharing. Most of my USB drives sit on my desk and don't get touched. I couldn't tell you what's on most of them. I've picked up a few thinking that I'll use it, but the most useful thing I've done with flash drives is to move data between computers when upgrading other people's computers. For me, I just make sure everything is backed up/synced to my local NAS, wipe the system and reinstall without a care in the world.
its amazing how its generally easier to transfer something to a server a country over for it to then reach the other device. instead of it going directly over local network speeds.
also how its much easier to backup to google than to you own computer thats right there.
In Android just selectively enable wireless ADB debugging and then use ADB Explorer. Easier than plugging the phone in, wireless, and allows access to all folders on the device (including /Android/data/* which is blocked from being accessed using on-device file explorers). Turn it off when you're done. Boom, wireless data transfer to and from an Android device at way faster than cabled SMB speeds.
IDK, have you tried to copy files over USB-C/USB 3.0 to a phone? I similarly thought it was going to be much faster than it actually is, but it's still mind bogglingly slow using MTP -- especially with file creation operations. Want to move 5,000 small text files totalling 20MB? You'll be there for 8 hours, haha.
In my experience ADB is significantly faster than a cable (even USB-C+3.0), even when ADB is connected wirelessly. I typically get 20MBps-40MBps using ADB regardless of whether I'm writing large files or a bunch of small files, where at best I will (and a cursory google search sems to indicate most people will) see 8MBps-10MBps over the cable for large files, and when I'm copying small files (e.g., game roms for ScummVM or something), I will get maybe 1Mbps at the top end. Results are consistent between computers I use to copy, cables I use to copy, and phones I've copied data to.
I'm honestly surprised that in 2024 copying data to a brand new flagship phone using a USB cable is as poor of an experience as it is.
I feel a bit like a bit of a fossil here, but why not drop the file into a network file share and grab it from there on your phone? No physical item required
Cx Expolorer on Android can access network shares and Samba shares like a desktop OS. It really isn't a particularly outdated option, it's so much less fiddly than direct drive access from a PC and it effectively works just like a USB stick, interface-wise, without having to do the whole "where did I put my thumbdrive" dance each time.
I usually just use Bluetooth cuz I'm only transferring an image or two over. But if it's something big, I just use USB transfer because when the phone is plugged into the computer, it appears as an external drive.
Using this double sided boy seems like it would be putting a lot of weight on the USB port... 🤔
I use WebDAV because my phones use that for all services which keeps everything on my own servers. Contacts, calendar, files, etc. Both Android and iPhone can be set up this way.
Is ADB faster than MTP (the thing that android does by default when connecting over USB)?
QRCP is also pretty neat. It boots up a local http server to send/receive files and shows a QR code pointing to it. Works on android via termux as well!
Google Drive might be the single worst website I have ever used. Idk why, but Everytime I have to use it it takes forever to load, even though I almost exclusively have text documents saved, and the goddamn download button doesn't even work half the time.
Whenever I have to use a cloud storage service for anything, I just add it to rclone. Solves the buggy UI problem pretty well! Dropbox/google drive subscriptions are a total scam, you can just create a new free account when your old one fills up /hj.
FX File Explorer + local servers = check and mate. If I need access to it immediately from a machine, put it on my /home/drive/desktop folder and it will sync to my computers in a few seconds, via synology drive. This also works over the internet, so I can move the files at home, leave, and power up my laptop to see them available, seamlessly.
I have a second server running Debian that does the first half, but not the syncing part. It's more for docker stuff, not personal files.
I'm disabled too, so the less I have to physically move around, the better. Having a server to just dump stuff on and access from anywhere is amazing.
I think Bluetooth is only around 2Mbps. For a lot of people (at least in developed countries) it'd even be quicker to upload the file somewhere then download it on the other device.
I knew a guy whose "password manager" was a discord server with only himself in it. He would just send username-password combinations as plaintext messages, and look back through the chat history when he needed to log in somewhere.
Didn't want to install something to move stuff of my laptop yesterday. Took a USB which has both a boot partition and a data partition, which worked on my W10 computer and moved it to the W11 laptop and it wouldn't recognize it...
Long story short, I had to manual set the partition id for the data part using diskpart for the data partition to be recognized. But that was a lot more effort than expected to move a few files over.
I have a USB c multi adapter somewhere. Had SD, micro SD, USB a to put a mouse on a phone or a regular flash drive. It was nifty until I lost it. A lot of modern mobos come with a USB c port so it's almost a universal tool.