SAF documentation seems a bit misleading: takePersistableUriPermission part only talks about files, but other sources seem to indicate that it also works for directories so it should be possible to request permissions to a directory and then maintain it correctly.

What permission does Google drive have? That is the permission that NextCloud should be able to use in order to provide comparative features. People use NextCloud because they want to host their own “cloud” at home. If Google don’t let Nextcloud use the same permissions as their own services how are they supposed to do that?

Not allowing third parties to use all of the platform features is the kind of behavior that people used to call Microsoft a monopolist. In that lens I'll never understand anybody who thinks Microsoft was a monopolist in the 90s but think that Google is not now.

Google absolutely is, but through lobbying they have managed to retain an antiquated definition of what the “market” is. I.e they would say it’s the mobile market, whereas the reality is that it’s now an “android” market and an “iOS” market.

That’s exactly what the EUs “digital markets act” was created to address. In a true market there are no walled gardens, the market is accessible to all.

Personally I think it’s not enough and that they should also be split up. Ideally I feel any corporation should be restricted to a single market segment or trade category.

Does Google Drive have the ability to synchronise arbitrary locations? I haven't used it in ages, but I don't think GDrive has any special features or abilities that NextCloud doesn't have.

It certainly doesn't have the permission that NextCloud says it needs.

When referring to google drive, I meant whatever the app/service is that backs up your device to Google Drive. As you cant switch out the backend that uses (it is hard coded to use google drive), you would need the same permissions in order to replicate it.

On Samsung devices you can backup to a Samsung account also.

Device backups are an entirely different system, not handled by the Drive app, that produces opaque backup archives which aren't accessible via the Drive UI. Nextcloud isn't complaining about lack of access to this system, but to the file-level APIs (e.g. java.io/java.nio classes) that allow for full backups of whatever the app has system-level permission to read.

According to the article they are complaining about not being granted the MANAGE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE permission.

https://developer.android.com/reference/android/Manifest.per...

This permission still doesn’t have the same access as the backup utility, but that is another issue really. If they aren’t willing to open that up then they need to allow for pluggable 3rd party storage backends.

Define "storage backend". You can implement a FileProvider to plug into the Storage Access Framework as a provider, so other apps can browse and request permissions for all of your app's files. You can use the Storage Access Framework as a consumer and ask the user for permissions to read any directory on external storage that is not Downloads/ or Android/{data,obb}, and any files exposed by other apps. Google's own apps use these APIs and do not declare MANAGE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE.

Maybe you need to actually read the article…

this is the second rebuttal you have made that is covered there.

I have read the article, thoroughly, as well as Nextcloud's blog post. This is the extent they have to say about why they cannot use SAF:

> SAF cannot be used, as it is for sharing/exposing our files to other apps

What I am saying is absolutely not covered by this statement, which is factually incorrect.

“some apps have a core use case that requires broad access to files on a device, but can't access them efficiently using the privacy-friendly storage best practices. Android provides a special app access called all-files access for these situations.”

“For example… anti-virus apps… file manager apps, backup and restore apps, and document management apps“

https://developer.android.com/training/data-storage/manage-a...

NextCloud provides backup, restore, and document management.

I guess you may know more about this than the official android docs, but maybe you are just being blinkered by some incorrect assumption?

Maybe we would be best to frame this another way. What permissions do NextCloud need to be able to replicate “Google One”? The complete replacement of Google drive (the service, not the app - you are consistently conflating the two) is what they aim to be. Is that something that can be done with SAF, or are Google using elevated permissions to lock competitors out?

Hi folks,

It's true some of our functionality can be rebuilt if we rewrite this functionality with SAF - even though it makes the user experience a bit worse. We have a file manager/document management app, which fits the use case for the full permission. There are some functions that are popular with some users like syncing a whole SD card, the download folder or the data of specific apps (in Android/data - some users use our app in a way as backup) that are just not possible with SAF. We get the security concerns from Google, but Box has this permission, so do quite some others, so our preferred solution is to re-gain the permission rather than bring back part of the functionality.

The good news is that this morning Google got back to us and told us that on resubmission we will regain the permission we need and our users regain all functionality within a few days.

So, this seems to have been resolved in a nice way. Thanks, all for the support!

NextCloud currently has to copy all files that it wants to upload & back up to its own app directory which is pain to actual usability. I'm guessing this annoyance is also related to these fun permission limitations.

Yep, and it extends to many other apps.

For example, the Kiwix app was able to read .zim files directly from SD card (which you very much want to do since e.g. Wikipedia is >100 Gb). Not anymore.

NextCloud can request permanent access to a folder on internal storage and read & sync those directly. That's how KDE Connect does it.

They haven't implemented the feature yet, at the moment.

Google broke backup, so the only way to get an e2e setup is with nextcloud. Obviously, a nightly backup of the phone can’t rely on user intervention.

SAF only requires user intervention once.

> The current state of Google Play is the result of years of Google being too permissive

Wrong. The current state is a result of Google monopolizing the android apps market. They should be split into 5 different companies.

I do not care about the reasons Google think they are protecting me. They are protecting their absurd profit.

Good guys should be able to iterate the files to help users achieve their goals.

Bad guys should be thrown into jail.

The API seems to have some peculiar restrictions, specifically that you cannot share the Downloads folder and no entire SD cards (only subfolders on the card). Maybe Nextcloud offered this functionality before and so couldn't restore it with the new API?

Also, unsurprisingly, data/ and obb/ are also forbidden, so the API is unusable for a backup tool.

data/ and obb/ also weren't accessible with the "manage all files" permission, nor were they accessible to built-in apps from Google (except the ones that own the files, of course).

> Google has made an API available for picking a directory to sync with

The available APIs are a pain to work with and have terrible performance. And it doesn't work at all with native code.

Also what about people using Nextcloud to back up their phones? It would need access to everything.

If I want to give an app access to all my files, google shouldn't have a say in that. Their paternalism is pervasive and palpable.