Saving files in Android 11 to external storage(SDK 30)

Question

I am writing a new Application on Android 11 (SDK Version 30) and I simply cannot find an example on how to save a file to the external storage.

I read their documentation and now know that they basicly ignore Manifest Permissions (READ_EXTERNAL_STORAGE and WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE). They also ignore the android:requestLegacyExternalStorage="true" in the manifest.xml application tag.

In their documentation https://developer.android.com/about/versions/11/privacy/storage they write you need to enable the DEFAULT_SCOPED_STORAGE and FORCE_ENABLE_SCOPED_STORAGE flags to enable scoped storage in your app.

Where do I have to enable those? And when I've done that how and when do I get the actual permission to write to the external storage? Can someone provide working code?
I want to save .gif, .png and .mp3 files. So I don't want to write to the gallery.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Corresponding To All Api, included Api 30, Android 11 :

public static File commonDocumentDirPath(String FolderName)
{
    File dir = null;
    if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.R)
    {
        dir = new File(Environment.getExternalStoragePublicDirectory(Environment.DIRECTORY_DOCUMENTS) + "/" + FolderName);
    }
    else
    {
        dir = new File(Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory() + "/" + FolderName);
    }

    // Make sure the path directory exists.
    if (!dir.exists())
    {
        // Make it, if it doesn't exit
        boolean success = dir.mkdirs();
        if (!success)
        {
            dir = null;
        }
    }
    return dir;
}

Now, use this commonDocumentDirPath for saving file.

A side note from comments, getExternalStoragePublicDirectory with certain scopes are now working with Api 30, Android 11. Cheers! Thanks to CommonsWare hints.

Answer 2

You can save files to the public directories on external storage.

Like Documents, Download, DCIM, Pictures and so on.

In the usual way like before version 10.