Syncthing-android: Wont sync sdcard folders/files, permission denied

Created on 8 Mar 2015 · 21Comments · Source: syncthing/syncthing-android

The screenshot should suffice,

folder is on /sdcard and default one Syncthing sets up
(and 2./3./4.) folder is on external sd card where I assume Syncthing dosn't have permissions to

(notice 2./3. and 4. has different paths but is actully the same directory, all is mounted by system)

Device is an stock 4.4.4 Sony Xperia Z1 Compact

invalid frozen-due-to-age

Source

jkaberg

Most helpful comment

Manually copying .stfolder from another working folder also fixed my syncing issue. I think syncthing has read, but no write access to the external sdcard. Can't this be mentioned in the GUI or the error? Can't the dependency on a writable .stfolder be ditched? I only want to sync from the card, not to it...

SjonHortensius on 5 Sep 2015

👍2

All 21 comments

As you said, syncthing doesn't have permission to access these folders.

I don't think we can do anything about this, only Google can.

Nutomic on 8 Mar 2015

Android KitKat has put a new restriction on SD cards. Apps that utilize the external SD card can access only a folder set aside for them. They cannot write to your external card's DCIM/Camera folder or a newly-created SYNC folder. If you are willing to root your phone, you can lift the restriction using NextApp's SDFix available on the play store. Otherwise, you have to put all your sync folders inside your SD card's location Android/com.nutomic.syncthingandroid. On my phone, that's /mnt/extSdCard/Android/com.nutomic.syncthingandroid.

pinapl on 10 Mar 2015

Yep. Maybe there should be a warning dialog about this in the app.

Nutomic on 10 Mar 2015

Hm, works fine for me on external SD card on Andriod 4.4.4 in Prestigio 5454...

chucic on 11 Mar 2015

To be precise, only the primary sdcard is accessible, so maybe internal storage isn't accessible in your case? That or the manufacturer modified Android there.

Nutomic on 11 Mar 2015

Not sure what you mean by primary, but both internal storage and SD card are accessible.
So if manufactor modified KitKat to make it work, I have an OT question:
Do we really live in the world where companies like google make shit software that is beeing used massively?

chucic on 11 Mar 2015

Well it does make sense, because every app writing to sd card has some security and usability problems (eg apps can't remove their data on uninstall, apps can access other app's data).

The Storage Access Framework can be used instead to access external storage, but few apps seem to support it (it also doesn't work with syncthing).

Nutomic on 11 Mar 2015

Hi all again,
Sorry for resurrecting the thread, but right now i'm sitting here a bit frustrated that i'm not able to do such an easy action as take photos from my android and get them on my PC.
From programming point of view, if synthing android app is able to access my photos, why shouldn't it transfer them to PC?
I cannot change the default dir for my photos on my phone (it is not rooted), so i cannot switch that to syncthing dir on sdcard... but i actually don't need that.
i just need one-way-syncronization, probably even without deleting, just one-way-uploading.
or am i missing something? :(

rshmelev on 18 Jun 2015

👍1

The camera folder should be synced by default when you install the app.

You can't change the path of an existing Syncthing folder, you'll have to create a new one.

Btw, the forum or IRC are better for support ;)

Nutomic on 18 Jun 2015

Default camera folder is working with built-in storage... and my camera app is working with sdcard.
I've tried to create numerous of folders, but each of them on sdcard has 0 files and 0 size...

Anyway thanks for the answer, if you think that forum or IRC is better then i'll try to write there, hopefully we'll meet there :)

rshmelev on 18 Jun 2015

If the sdcard is your primary storage, sync should work. Otherwise, it's probably #29 (if you use Kitkat or higher).

Can you check the logs?

Nutomic on 18 Jun 2015

after creating .stignore and .stfolder and .stfolders inside dcim dir and reinstalling the app it started working...

i'm attaching logs that i was able to save...
(the interesting thing about these logs is that .stignore file was already present)

--------- beginning of /dev/log/system
--------- beginning of /dev/log/main
I/SyncthingNativeCode(32646): [2TMB4] 21:22:55 WARNING: Loading .stignore: open /storage/sdcard1/dcim/.stignore: permission denied
I/SyncthingNativeCode(32646): [2TMB4] 21:22:55 WARNING: Loading .stignore: open /storage/sdcard1/dcim/.stignore: permission denied
I/SyncthingNativeCode(32646): [2TMB4] 21:23:05 WARNING: Loading .stignore: open /storage/sdcard1/dcim/.stignore: permission denied
I/SyncthingNativeCode(32646): [2TMB4] 21:23:05 WARNING: Loading .stignore: open /storage/sdcard1/dcim/.stignore: permission denied
I/SyncthingNativeCode(32646): [2TMB4] 21:23:15 WARNING: Loading .stignore: open /storage/sdcard1/dcim/.stignore: permission denied
I/SyncthingNativeCode(32646): [2TMB4] 21:23:15 WARNING: Loading .stignore: open /storage/sdcard1/dcim/.stignore: permission denied
I/SyncthingNativeCode( 3320): [2TMB4] 21:23:27 INFO: syncthing v0.11.9 (go1.4.2 linux-arm android) [email protected] 2015-06-14 11:52:00 UTC
I/SyncthingNativeCode( 3320): [2TMB4] 21:23:27 INFO: My ID: .....
I/SyncthingNativeCode( 3320): [2TMB4] 21:23:28 INFO: Database block cache capacity 13627 KiB
I/SyncthingNativeCode( 3320): [2TMB4] 21:23:28 FATAL: Cannot open database: resource temporarily unavailable - Is another copy of Syncthing already running?
E/SyncthingNativeCode( 3320): Syncthing binary crashed with error code 1

... but as it is working now, thanks for your help and feel free to ask me if you'll need some more debugging - i'll try to do it :+1:

what i like about the syncthing is the idea of free decentralized file distribution - it is really awesome! thank you guys ! :)

rshmelev on 19 Jun 2015

The .stignore file isn't needed for sync (just checked one of my repos, and it isn't there).

That database error and crash seem like you have a second instance of Syncthing running already, a device restart should fix that. Anyway, glad it works now :)

Nutomic on 19 Jun 2015

SjonHortensius on 5 Sep 2015

👍2

The web ui would tell you that .stfolder is missing, and no, we cannot ditch it as that's the only way for us to know that the mount is still there.

AudriusButkevicius on 5 Sep 2015

Why was this issue closed as invalid? It is very valid. And the workaround is easy to: Make the user “open” the root of the SD card(s) in Android’s regular file browser. That’s what ES File Explorer does and it’s working fine.

Of course you should probably add a warning that adding a folder directly via the web interface is not supported.

fuzzykiller on 26 Dec 2015

And the workaround is easy to

That is not a workaround, but an implementation of the new API available since Android 5. GO does not support this API, so Syncthing cannot use it.
This was closed, because the real issue is already discussed in #29.

wweich on 26 Dec 2015

I have android 5.1.1 on my Samsung P605 (galaxy note tab 2014) and I cannot understand why Syncthing is not able to write to the external sd card.
If you go to settings->[..]->Apps it HAS the rights to read and write to the external sd.

I also tried to manually create the folder and copy the .stfolder file. No luck.

lerrigatto on 22 Jan 2016

@lerrigatto See the discussion in #29. Tl;dr things were changed in 4.4, and we currently don't have a way to write to external storage.

Nutomic on 22 Jan 2016

Would using root a possibility through SuperSU ? Would only work on rooted devices, but it would add a very useful feature as most, if not all, of my data is on external SD(s).