How do you write to a folder on an SD card in Android?
Add Permission to Android Manifest
Add this WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE permission to your applications manifest.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
package="your.company.package"
android:versionCode="1"
android:versionName="0.1">
<application android:icon="@drawable/icon" android:label="@string/app_name">
<!-- ... -->
</application>
<uses-sdk android:minSdkVersion="7" />
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE" />
</manifest>
Check availability of external storage
You should always check for availability first. A snippet from the official android documentation on external storage.
boolean mExternalStorageAvailable = false;
boolean mExternalStorageWriteable = false;
String state = Environment.getExternalStorageState();
if (Environment.MEDIA_MOUNTED.equals(state)) {
// We can read and write the media
mExternalStorageAvailable = mExternalStorageWriteable = true;
} else if (Environment.MEDIA_MOUNTED_READ_ONLY.equals(state)) {
// We can only read the media
mExternalStorageAvailable = true;
mExternalStorageWriteable = false;
} else {
// Something else is wrong. It may be one of many other states, but all we need
// to know is we can neither read nor write
mExternalStorageAvailable = mExternalStorageWriteable = false;
}
Use a Filewriter
At last but not least forget about the FileOutputStream
and use a FileWriter
instead. More information on that class form the FileWriter javadoc. You'll might want to add some more error handling here to inform the user.
// get external storage file reference
FileWriter writer = new FileWriter(getExternalStorageDirectory());
// Writes the content to the file
writer.write("This\n is\n an\n example\n");
writer.flush();
writer.close();
File sdCard = Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory();
File dir = new File (sdCard.getAbsolutePath() + "/dir1/dir2");
dir.mkdirs();
File file = new File(dir, "filename");
FileOutputStream f = new FileOutputStream(file);
...
Found the answer here - http://mytechead.wordpress.com/2014/01/30/android-create-a-file-and-write-to-external-storage/
It says,
/**
* Method to check if user has permissions to write on external storage or not
*/
public static boolean canWriteOnExternalStorage() {
// get the state of your external storage
String state = Environment.getExternalStorageState();
if (Environment.MEDIA_MOUNTED.equals(state)) {
// if storage is mounted return true
Log.v("sTag", "Yes, can write to external storage.");
return true;
}
return false;
}
and then let’s use this code to actually write to the external storage:
// get the path to sdcard
File sdcard = Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory();
// to this path add a new directory path
File dir = new File(sdcard.getAbsolutePath() + "/your-dir-name/");
// create this directory if not already created
dir.mkdir();
// create the file in which we will write the contents
File file = new File(dir, "My-File-Name.txt");
FileOutputStream os = outStream = new FileOutputStream(file);
String data = "This is the content of my file";
os.write(data.getBytes());
os.close();
And this is it. If now you visit your /sdcard/your-dir-name/ folder you will see a file named - My-File-Name.txt with the content as specified in the code.
PS:- You need the following permission -
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE" />