I have a few questions about app install locations for the g-tablet. There are three places where apps can go: 1. internal memory, 2. internal sd card, 3. external sd card.
For internal memory, I can see the installed apps (the apk files) at /data/app. I cannot find any evidence of any apps installed on the internal sd card (do they stay packaged in the apk file or get exploded out). What directory do they get put into on the internal sd card? In case you're wondering, according to App 2 SD Pro, I have 10 apps installed on the sd card.
Is there a way to install apps on the external sd card? Everything that I've read about and the sd card app managers that I've tried only work between the internal memory and the internal sd card.
Hmmm...nothing but crickets. Not even a question for more information? Well, here is a little more anyway. The tablet is rooted and I have tnt-lite 4.4.0 installed. I'm using Root Explorer to browse around in the file system.
This discussion might help, somewhat.
Yes, that other post was somewhat helpful. I can see the apps that have been moved to the "internal" SD card are at /mnt/asec with Root Explorer (I didn't have to unmount either...but the .android_secure folder did show as empty).
A couple of other questions for you:
1. Are you using a remote Linux machine to do those find commands or is there a way to get to that command line on the g tablet? I only have Windows so I may be stuck there.
2. Unmounting the SD card in the Settings will unmount the "external" SD card, right? not the "internal" SD card?
3. Do you know anything on my other original question about the "external" SD card? Can we move apps there some how? If not, I'd be game to try to write an app that will do it but my guess is that if there isn't an app that does it already, its probably harder than it seems that it should be.
Puhn said:
(I didn't have to unmount either...but the .android_secure folder did show as empty).
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If you unmount the SD card (internal or external -- depends on the ROM), you will see stuff in /mnt/sdcard/.android_secure/.
1. Are you using a remote Linux machine to do those find commands or is there a way to get to that command line on the g tablet?
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I use a telnet session into the gTablet, but, you can run the commands either inside a Terminal emulator or via adb. It usually doesn't matter how you run the commands.
2. Unmounting the SD card in the Settings will unmount the "external" SD card, right? not the "internal" SD card?
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Depends on the ROM. In CyanogenMod, the SD card is the removable SD card. The internal non-removable one is called "emmc" (mounted under /mnt/emmc). Other ROMs have /mnt/sdcard and /mnt/sdcard2 (Froyo/GB) or /mnt/sdcard and /mnt/external_sd (Honeycomb ROMs).
3. Do you know anything on my other original question about the "external" SD card? Can we move apps there some how? If not, I'd be game to try to write an app that will do it but my guess is that if there isn't an app that does it already, its probably harder than it seems that it should be.
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CyanogenMod does what you want by default. As I mentioned above, for it /mnt/sdcard is always the external removable SD card. So, everything "moved to SD card" ends up on the external SD. If you want other ROMs to behave this way, you'll have to change some of the /init*.rc files and the /system/etc/vold.fstab file and change what gets mounted as /mnt/sdcard (ie, which device is assigned the "sdcard" label). Look around, the changes are fairly obvious.
My recommedation, however, is to just install CyanogenMod and avoid the /init*.rc and vold/fstab hackery.
Good information. Huge THANKS !
One last question (hopefully)...if the SD card in CyanogenMod is the external SD card, I guess I have the reverse question for it. Can/how do you move apps to the non-removable SD card?
I guess what I'm getting at is I have a 16 GB internal, non-removable SD card and a 16 GB removable SD card that I'd like to maximize the use of. I'm not stuck with only being able to put apps on one or the other depending on the installed ROM am I?
Puhn said:
I guess what I'm getting at is I have a 16 GB internal, non-removable SD card and a 16 GB removable SD card that I'd like to maximize the use of. I'm not stuck with only being able to put apps on one or the other depending on the installed ROM am I?
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Heh. What started as a simple question about App install locations has now progressed to low-level mucking about with the system. What next--RAID using the SD cards?
To answer your question, with the standard, unmodified ROM you are stuck with only using either one or the other. But, since Android is based on Linux, (and since we have the source code for most of the programs on the system), it can be made to do a lot of non-standard things.
I'm pretty sure that the system can be modified to use both the internal and external SD cards for App installations, but, this will need a fair bit of customization of the ROM. Which means that if you switch ROMs or even upgrade the current one, the setup will have to be redone again.
Therefore, my recommendation, is that you use one of the SD cards solely for app installs and the other only for storing media/books/whatever. 16GB only for apps is a fair bit of space, I feel.
rajeevvp said:
Heh. What started as a simple question about App install locations has now progressed to low-level mucking about with the system.
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Well, I had hoped to avoid the mucking about part and that one of the available ROMs already had the ability to put apps anywhere but it sounds like that is not the case. I guess I wasn't clear with my original question.
Anyway, thanks for all of the answers. I'll stick with what I've got for now. At some point I may play around with some things and see how thoroughly mucked up I can get it.
Hey
I'm trying to install HexDefense on my phone and i get an error saying,"Couldn't install on USB storage or SD card."
I looked up the issue on google, and many people said there is this file,"smdl2tmp1."
I could not find it, I had hidden files shown, and all. Checked internal and external storage, could not find it either. Tried formatting my sd card, didn't work either .
Anyone knows??
Help please!
Note: The only thing that works so far is unmounting my SD card and installing the app from the market. But I install so many apps using APKs which I put on the SD card...and for example, if it's HexDefense apk, it would fail to install it.
Some apps seem to install to internal memory by default, and some to sd card if one is present.
Even more annoyingly however, many of the apps that default to SD card if you move them to internal memory MOVE BACK TO THE SD CARD when you update them.
Is there any way to prevent apps from automatically installing to the SD card? Or at the very least, installing to SD card is fine... but to prevent them from moving BACK to the sd card when you update them?
I've seen this question in 3 different topics on XDA and none of them is answered. My question is similar to this; Apps are installed on internal memory but app data is on external. As a result i have a completely empty internal memory and a full sd card. Tried possible suggestions on other sites but didn't work. Why can't we choose where to install the app data? How to move the app data back, since app2sd wouldn't work on this situation.
FYI, buy a bigger memory card is NOT a solution, it's a workaround for the actual problem..
Cyber Akuma said:
Some apps seem to install to internal memory by default, and some to sd card if one is present.
Even more annoyingly however, many of the apps that default to SD card if you move them to internal memory MOVE BACK TO THE SD CARD when you update them.
Is there any way to prevent apps from automatically installing to the SD card? Or at the very least, installing to SD card is fine... but to prevent them from moving BACK to the sd card when you update them?
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Looks like your problem can be solved with "link2sd" which gives a permanent option on where to install apps. Search it in Google Play.
In my case (i have three different memory blocks) you have to do a repartition and a custom rom but i don't want to go there so i just mapped the drives with editing vold.fstab and bought a bigger memory card
Hello, after hours of looking, and trying and researching, I have to ask for help.
I have a ROOTED Android 4.2.1 SONY Xperia SX (SO-05D).
I want to make all my installed apps, and future apps to be installed in the Micro SD Card I Installed (32GB).
In the root drive, there's a folder called: "ext_card" I tried moving things there manually and nothing.
I also tried manually in /sdcard/external_sd and nothing still.
I have tried the following apps:
App Manager
Force2SD
App Shifter
Folder Mounter
Link2SD
And nothing!
The only thing that's actually saving in the Micro SD are the Pictures I take, in the DCIM folder.
Can anybody help me please.
I do not want to save anything in the "internal storage", and also most of the apps only allow to move to the "SD" part of the internal phone memory, nothing is actually being moved or being installed in the Micro SD Card.
Please help!!!!!
hello
i use my sd card as portable and after updating to latest snapshot i have noticed that the file manager is still showing /storage/emulated/0 which used to be gone in earlier snapshot after choosing sd as portable. now many apps cant find the right path to sd and using this /storage/emulated/0 as external which is actually internal storage. is there any solution?
shane389 said:
hello
i use my sd card as portable and after updating to latest snapshot i have noticed that the file manager is still showing /storage/emulated/0 which used to be gone in earlier snapshot after choosing sd as portable. now many apps cant find the right path to sd and using this /storage/emulated/0 as external which is actually internal storage. is there any solution?
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Hello and welcome to XDA Q&A section of the Forum.
If you could please put what apps can't acces the sdcard that would be great. Also, have you used apps2sd?