Google has been tightening the grip of what third-party file managers are allowed to do, with the usual excuse of "for your protection". In other words, Google thinks you are a little baby who can't make decisions on your own.
As a replacement, they offer us their own file manager that is bundled with Android.
However, Google's file manager is far from ideal. It still lacks basic functionality such as:
ES File Explorer had all of these abilities as early as 2012, with the exception of the recycle bin, which was added around 2014.
Google could easily implement all of them too if they wanted to, because they have an astronomical budget. They could easily pay programmers to implement these features on a single afternoon. But for some reason, Google does not want to implement these useful features, otherwise they would already have done it long ago. Instead, they implement useless pull-to-refresh (more details in appendix 1).
For a long time, Android OS didn't even have a built-in file manager, so using third-party file managers was the only option. As a result, file managers boomed on the Play Store. They were some of the most popular apps. ES File Explorer, Astro file manager, RhythmSoft File Manager HD - these were installed tens of millions of times.
Those third-party file managers were more functional in the early 2010s than today's Google file manager. Other things are missing from Android too. Even today, Android does not bundle a basic text editor. At least it can show text files through its built-in HTML viewer. These are things desktop operating systems like Windows and Linux had since their beginnings.
But, in 2014, if anyone remembers, Google started attacking the freedom of file access for third-party apps in Android 4.4 KitKat. They made the MicroSD card mostly read-only. Apps could only write in their own directories located inside
And for what benefit? If the goal of denying write access to the MicroSD card was to "clean up junk", why not also for the internal storage?
How come Google didn't feel the need back then to make internal storage read-only as well? After all, internal storage is usually smaller than MicroSD, therefore the same data takes a higher percentage of space on internal storage than on MicroSD.
Some user data should not be "cleaned up" (deleted) anyway when an app is uninstalled. For example, if you uninstall a third-party camera app, do you want all photos you took using it to be deleted along with it?
Google could easily have added an option to let the user decide if they even want such "protections" (restrictions), like this:
โ
And we all know what happened from there. Storage Access Framework and Scoped Storage.
As a replacement for crippling third-party file managers, Google offers us something that is hardly more functional than a file picker, for opening files inside other apps such as a web browser, for uploading. And indeed, as a fun fact, Google's own file manager actually descended from file pickers!
Google's file manager originates from the file picker codenamed "DocumentsUI". Even nowadays, Google's file manager is a glorified file picker with a few extra buttons (copy, move, rename).
Pull-to-refresh has been accepted as a normal part of the mobile user experience even though it doesn't deserve to be. Swiping down must be for scrolling up and nothing else. (Why I hate pull-to-refresh.)
At least, to my positive surprise, accidentally refreshing with "pull-to-refresh" does not clear an existing selection of files.
It also lets you give files names longer than 100 characters, where as Samsung limits you to 100 characters, and even 50 characters on earlier versions!
It also lets you select the first item without holding, by tapping the icon left to the file name (or the thumbnail in list view). You can also view the "Get info" (properties) for the current directory without having to go to the parent directory, by accessing "Get info" from the top left menu
It can also run in multiple windows that are accessible from the recently used app list (or whatever the name for it is). There is a "new window" option in the top menu. Samsung "My Files" can't do that. ES File Explorer had tabbed browsing, which is similar.
They also added a "compress" feature, which can create a ZIP archive from selected files folders. Samsung "My Files" had this at least since 2013, and since around 2021 it has a 7zip option too. ES File Explorer had 7zip since at least 2016.
Another good thing is that file copying and moving runs in background, so there is no pop-up that prevents you from using the file manager until the copy or move is completed. The progress is shown in a notification, which is far less intrusive than a pop-up that some file managers have.
Stock file managers have always been well behind third-party ones in terms of functionality, sadly. Probably because Google and Samsung think it makes them easier to use for inexperienced smartphone users, when in reality it doesn't make a difference to them. Just put advanced features into a sub menu for power users and make both worlds happy.
[I hereby release this post into the public domain under CC 0 1.0. You can repost it wherever you like without crediting me.]
As a replacement, they offer us their own file manager that is bundled with Android.
However, Google's file manager is far from ideal. It still lacks basic functionality such as:
- A draggable scrollbar.
- Showing the total size of all files in a folder.
- Showing the total size of multiple selected items (files or folders).
- Limiting search to only the current directory, not the entire storage.
- Jumping to parent directory from a search result.
- Remembering the sorting preference, for example "sort by last modified". It goes back to alphabetical every time.
- Selecting all items between two selected items with one touch. Similar to shift+click on desktop. This is useful for folders with thousands of files.
- Showing the full path of a file on the "Get info" page. This is the equivalent to "properties" on Windows and various Linux file managers.
- It didn't even feature a "properties" or "Get info" page at all for a long time.
- Staying in the current directory after tapping "copy to" or "move to". Instead, it jumps to the "Downloads" folder. This means if you want to move something to a subfolder of the current folder, you have to navigate the entire way to the current folder from the beginning. Samsung "My Files" once had this bad behaviour, but at least Samsung realized it and changed it for the better.
- Creating blank new files.
- It has no "open with" which lets you select which app to open a file with.
- It has no "copy file path to clipboard" feature.
- It can not create checksums from files.
- It doesn't make use of Android's built-in recycle bin feature.
ES File Explorer had all of these abilities as early as 2012, with the exception of the recycle bin, which was added around 2014.
Google could easily implement all of them too if they wanted to, because they have an astronomical budget. They could easily pay programmers to implement these features on a single afternoon. But for some reason, Google does not want to implement these useful features, otherwise they would already have done it long ago. Instead, they implement useless pull-to-refresh (more details in appendix 1).
For a long time, Android OS didn't even have a built-in file manager, so using third-party file managers was the only option. As a result, file managers boomed on the Play Store. They were some of the most popular apps. ES File Explorer, Astro file manager, RhythmSoft File Manager HD - these were installed tens of millions of times.
Those third-party file managers were more functional in the early 2010s than today's Google file manager. Other things are missing from Android too. Even today, Android does not bundle a basic text editor. At least it can show text files through its built-in HTML viewer. These are things desktop operating systems like Windows and Linux had since their beginnings.
But, in 2014, if anyone remembers, Google started attacking the freedom of file access for third-party apps in Android 4.4 KitKat. They made the MicroSD card mostly read-only. Apps could only write in their own directories located inside
Android/data.(source)source.android.com (2014) said:
And for what benefit? If the goal of denying write access to the MicroSD card was to "clean up junk", why not also for the internal storage?
How come Google didn't feel the need back then to make internal storage read-only as well? After all, internal storage is usually smaller than MicroSD, therefore the same data takes a higher percentage of space on internal storage than on MicroSD.
Some user data should not be "cleaned up" (deleted) anyway when an app is uninstalled. For example, if you uninstall a third-party camera app, do you want all photos you took using it to be deleted along with it?
Google could easily have added an option to let the user decide if they even want such "protections" (restrictions), like this:
โ
And we all know what happened from there. Storage Access Framework and Scoped Storage.
As a replacement for crippling third-party file managers, Google offers us something that is hardly more functional than a file picker, for opening files inside other apps such as a web browser, for uploading. And indeed, as a fun fact, Google's own file manager actually descended from file pickers!
Google's file manager originates from the file picker codenamed "DocumentsUI". Even nowadays, Google's file manager is a glorified file picker with a few extra buttons (copy, move, rename).
Appendixโ
(appendix 1) Instead of those useful features, Google's file manager features pull-to-refresh, which wastes your battery power on needless refreshes each time you scroll up too much.Pull-to-refresh has been accepted as a normal part of the mobile user experience even though it doesn't deserve to be. Swiping down must be for scrolling up and nothing else. (Why I hate pull-to-refresh.)
At least, to my positive surprise, accidentally refreshing with "pull-to-refresh" does not clear an existing selection of files.
Giving credit where credit is due.โ
Granted, Google's file manager still has useful features such as large two-column thumbnails in grid view. This makes it useful for browsing photos and videos, and I admittedly often use it for that purpose.It also lets you give files names longer than 100 characters, where as Samsung limits you to 100 characters, and even 50 characters on earlier versions!
It also lets you select the first item without holding, by tapping the icon left to the file name (or the thumbnail in list view). You can also view the "Get info" (properties) for the current directory without having to go to the parent directory, by accessing "Get info" from the top left menu
It can also run in multiple windows that are accessible from the recently used app list (or whatever the name for it is). There is a "new window" option in the top menu. Samsung "My Files" can't do that. ES File Explorer had tabbed browsing, which is similar.
They also added a "compress" feature, which can create a ZIP archive from selected files folders. Samsung "My Files" had this at least since 2013, and since around 2021 it has a 7zip option too. ES File Explorer had 7zip since at least 2016.
Another good thing is that file copying and moving runs in background, so there is no pop-up that prevents you from using the file manager until the copy or move is completed. The progress is shown in a notification, which is far less intrusive than a pop-up that some file managers have.
Stock file managers have always been well behind third-party ones in terms of functionality, sadly. Probably because Google and Samsung think it makes them easier to use for inexperienced smartphone users, when in reality it doesn't make a difference to them. Just put advanced features into a sub menu for power users and make both worlds happy.
[I hereby release this post into the public domain under CC 0 1.0. You can repost it wherever you like without crediting me.]
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