I have a sony music player (android) with an internal SD card. My music library is on a Windows 11 PC, all in one folder. I want to simply copy any changes in the Windows folder to the Music folder on the SD card on the android.
On the Windows side, it looks pretty straightforward. On the Android side, I’m trying to use the GUI to specify which folder to sync to, but the only UI is a textbox where I have to put in the path. Anybody know the magic words for “SD Card/Muisc”? Or is there some graphical UI that allows me to browse to that folder?
Thanks.
Presumably, once I’ve specified the folder on the android device the UI will allow me to pair the two.
Normally, you should be presented with a folder picker, which also takes care of permissions to access the folder in question, etc. In the original Android app, there was a setting to enable “advanced folder picker”. Please check if that is also present in the Syncthing-Fork. If yes, then you can try to enable or disable it and see if there’s any difference.
I’ve looked through the settings, and the closest thing I see is “Local Discovery” and “Global Discovery” and both are enabled by default. I’ve tried turning them off, but no change in behavior, so I reset both to default.
I tried /sdcard/Music, but that failed. And then the textbox becomes read only so I can’t easily try other options. I tried removing the folder and creating a new one with the path /mnt/sdcard and when I entered /mnt a folder picker appeared, but there was no option for an sdcard. I typed it in manually, but I still get an error.
I’ve asked Sony support for info on how they specify the file path for the sd card, but so far nobody there knows anything. I’m not eager to go back to Resilio sync, but SynchThing isn’t working for me.
I’ll try to check the app later and show you some screenshots of the setting on question. /sdcard is not SD card but actually the internal storage.
Edit:
From your explanation, it also seems that you’re trying to use the Web GUI to add the folder. In order to gain the required permissions to sync a path on an SD card, you probably need to use the app UI instead, and add the folder to Syncthing there.
I tried finding the file path using EX File Manager, which seems to report the path as /storage/041C-3602/Music but that doesn’t work either.
(I assume that there’s a good reason why the file path is read only after saving a newly created folder, but it would make it a lot easier to troubleshoot this if I didn’t have to remove and re-create the folder every time I tried a different path.)
When I click on the “hamburger menu” I see several options:
Show Device ID
Recent Changes
Web GUI
Import and Export
Restart
Tips and Tricks
Settings
I have been using the Web GUI to Add a folder. I guess that doesn’t work.
I tried using the + folder icon on the FOLDERS tab and was able to create the folder and browse to the Music folder on the sd card. It seems to have taken that, so I’m getting somewhere. (not sure why a non-functional ui is offered, but whatever)
But when I look at the status on the PC the Remote Device is throwing errors: “No connection could be made because the target maching actively refused it.”
So, it seems now to be a permissions issue. Looking through the various menu items in Settings on the android device I’m not seeing anything obvious. I had syncing working with my old PC via Resilio Sync, for what that’s worth.
On the Android device the STATUS tab says Synchthing is not running.
Reason:
Synchthing in not configured to run on mobile data connection
Synchthing is allowed to run on WiFi and WiFi is currently connected
Synchthing is allowed to run on non-metered WiFi connections. The active Wifi connection is non-metered
Synchthing is allowed to run on the current WiFi network.
This doesn’t make any sense. I’m not using mobile data (the android device is not a phone, so there is no mobile data to use). WiFi is connected, and Synchthing seems to think it should work.
I’ve tried restarting the device, and restarting Synchthing on it.
The app’s interface is very limited, so the Web GUI is indeed required if you intend to use the more advanced Syncthing configuration, however specifically when adding a folder for the first time, it should be done via the app UI, so that Android prompts it to grant full access to the path in question. Otherwise, you will only be able to use the path as read-only, which you’ve already experienced.
This error isn’t about permissions. Normally, it’s because the devices aren’t actually properly connected (e.g. not added/accepted on either side) or there are other connectivity issues (e.g. firewall, etc.).
Please make sure that Syncthing is allowed to access location in background all the time. This needs to be done in the Android permission settings. Otherwise, the app won’t be able to detect whether you’re connected to Wi-Fi or not.
Looking at the logfile, I’m seeing “Access denied finding property 'vendor.display.enable_optimal_refresh_rate” a bunch of times but no other obvious error messages.
The logfile is hard to read on the tiny Sony device and I’m not seeing it in the file system where I’d expect it (Android\data\com.github.catfriend1.syncthingandroid\files) so I can’t open it with a text editor on my PC or easily share it here.
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