Open custom filetype in Samsung file explorer

Question

I have two custom filetypes that my app can handle that I would like to be able to open from a wide variety of other apps. What I have is working for many including Gmail and the Settings file explorer, but there several third file managers (including Samsung My Files and Astro File Manager) that do not recognize these filetypes as belonging to my app. Is there a way to craft an intent filter that will enable these file explorer apps to recognize that these files should be opened by my app?

Here's the existing intent filters:

<intent-filter>
    <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />

    <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
</intent-filter>

<!-- See http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1733195/android-intent-filter-for-a-particular-file-extension/2062112#2062112 -->


<!--
        Capture content by MIME type, which is how Gmail broadcasts
        attachment open requests.  pathPattern and file extensions
        are ignored, so the MIME type *MUST* be explicit, otherwise
        we will match absolutely every file opened.
-->
<intent-filter
    android:icon="@drawable/book"
    android:label="@string/app_name"
    android:priority="50">
    <action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />

    <category android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE" />
    <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />

    <!-- needed for properly formatted email messages -->
    <data
        android:mimeType="application/vnd.bloom"
        android:scheme="content" />
    <!-- needed for mangled email messages -->
    <data
        android:mimeType="application/bloom"
        android:scheme="content" />
    <!-- needed for properly formatted email messages -->
    <data
        android:mimeType="application/vnd.bloomd"
        android:scheme="content" />
    <!-- needed for mangled email messages -->
    <data
        android:mimeType="application/bloomd"
        android:scheme="content" />
    <!-- needed for properly formatted email messages -->
    <data
        android:mimeType="application/vnd.bloombundle"
        android:scheme="content" />
    <!-- needed for mangled email messages -->
    <data
        android:mimeType="application/bloombundle"
        android:scheme="content" />
    <!-- needed for mangled email messages -->
    <data
        android:mimeType="application/octet-stream"
        android:scheme="content" />
</intent-filter>

<!--
        Capture file open requests (pathPattern is honoured) where no
        MIME type is provided in the Intent.  An Intent with a null
        MIME type will never be matched by a filter with a set MIME
        type, so we need a second intent-filter if we wish to also
        match files with this extension and a non-null MIME type
        (even if it is non-null but zero length).
-->
<intent-filter
    android:icon="@drawable/book"
    android:label="@string/app_name"
    android:priority="50">
    <action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />

    <category android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE" />
    <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />

    <data android:scheme="file" />
    <data android:host="*" />

    <!--
            Work around Android's ugly primitive PatternMatcher
            implementation that can't cope with finding a . early in
            the path unless it's explicitly matched.
    -->
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
</intent-filter>

<!--
        Capture file open requests (pathPattern is honoured) where a
        (possibly blank) MIME type is provided in the Intent.  This
        filter may only be necessary for supporting ES File Explorer,
        which has the probably buggy behaviour of using an Intent
        with a MIME type that is set but zero-length.  It's
        impossible to match such a type except by using a global
        wildcard.
-->
<intent-filter
    android:icon="@drawable/book"
    android:label="@string/app_name"
    android:priority="50">
    <action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />

    <category android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE" />
    <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />

    <data android:scheme="file" />
    <data android:host="*" />
    <data android:mimeType="*/*" />

    <!--
            Work around Android's ugly primitive PatternMatcher
            implementation that can't cope with finding a . early in
            the path unless it's explicitly matched.
    -->
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloomd" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
    <data android:pathPattern=".*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\..*\\.bloombundle" />
</intent-filter>

Did you get any solution? – krupal.agile May 22 '19 at 06:39 — krupal.agile, May 22 '19 at 06:39

Rick Conrad · Answer 1 · 2019-04-08T08:44:38.870

I now have a solution that works for several common file managers including Samsung's. What you need is one filter that specifies a MIME type, and a separate filter that does not specify a MIME type and filters based on file extension. I added one more that uses a wildcard MIME type and filters based on file extension since at least one file manager seemed to specifying an empty MIME type.

The discussion of exactly how elements work in the filter is worth reading carefully several times: https://developer.android.com/guide/components/intents-filters#DataTest

Solution:

    <!-- Matches intents by MIME type -->
    <intent-filter
        android:icon="@drawable/book"
        android:label="@string/app_name">
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />

        <category android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE" />
        <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />

        <data android:scheme="content" />
        <data android:scheme="file" />
        <data android:mimeType="application/vnd.bloom" />
        <data android:mimeType="application/bloom" />
        <data android:mimeType="application/vnd.bloomd" />
        <data android:mimeType="application/bloomd" />
        <data android:mimeType="application/vnd.bloombundle" />
        <data android:mimeType="application/bloombundle" />
        <data android:mimeType="application/octet-stream" />
    </intent-filter>

    <!-- Matches intents by file extension -->
    <intent-filter
        android:icon="@drawable/book"
        android:label="@string/app_name">
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.SEND" />

        <category android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE" />
        <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />

        <data android:scheme="content" />
        <data android:scheme="file" />
        <data android:host="*" />
        <data android:pathPattern=".*bloomd" />
        <data android:pathPattern=".*bloombundle" />
    </intent-filter>

    <!-- Matches intents by file extension when an empty MIME type is set -->
    <intent-filter
        android:icon="@drawable/book"
        android:label="@string/app_name">
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.SEND" />

        <category android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE" />
        <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />

        <data android:mimeType="*/*" />

        <data android:scheme="content" />
        <data android:scheme="file" />
        <data android:host="*" />
        <data android:pathPattern=".*bloomd" />
        <data android:pathPattern=".*bloombundle" />
    </intent-filter>

EDIT:

The solution above will fail to match a file that has a b in the path before bloomd. See this answer for details on why and how to overcome that.

Unfortunately this does not work on a Samsung S8 running Android 8. Attempting to open a custom filetype using the "My Files" app creates an intent without mimetype and a Uri like "content://0@media/external/file/123". Thus a pathPattern does not work here... The only solution I found is registering for all files by removing the pathPattern, which seems like an awful solution. — TomTasche, Feb 03 '19 at 08:44

Intraterrestrial · Answer 2 · 2022-08-03T00:46:22.227

1

What i did in order, so it works in samsung my files app is this:

<intent-filter>
    <action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />
    <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />
    <data android:mimeType="*/*" />
    <data android:scheme="content" />
    <data android:scheme="file" />
</intent-filter>

Because app is not done correctly, its not your manifest its samsung file explorer.

edited Aug 03 '22 at 00:46

answered Aug 03 '22 at 00:45

Intraterrestrial

21
3

score 0 · Answer 3 · edited Jul 19 '20 at 02:54

0

It seams, Samsung's "My Files" for unknown file types do not send intent at all. So no intent-filter can help here.

edited Jul 19 '20 at 02:54

Muhammad Saqlain

2,112
4
33
48

answered Jul 18 '20 at 21:49

Александр

1
1

Open custom filetype in Samsung file explorer

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