How to get a Windows File Explorer Wi-Fi connection to Android to show photo thumbnails?

Paul wrote:
[...]

https://superuser.com/questions/1550...age-thumbnails

"Unless you have very special server support, you can't generate
the thumbnails or edit the files without first downloading them.

FTP doesn't allow you to do this as part of the protocol.
"

Presenting the information in a "pretty" way, is why
we have web servers. So at least in this "remote" interface
case, we need the server side to support these ideas, rather
than the client side. The client side is not allowed to
do anything which is "not scalable". As that thread above discusses,
if the client has to download the entire site to generate thumbnails
for everything, that isn't a scalable idea. And it defeats the
purpose of using thumbnails, if it forces "downloading everything
in sight".

However, if the server side is actually an HTTP server, that allows
a more intelligent server presentation. But it would also ruin client
integration on the client side.

This brings me to a - rather far-fetched - suggestion for 'Roy':

Try if a switch from FTP server/client to WebDAV server/client can
solve this thumbnails 'problem'.

- (For example) On Android:
"WebDAV Server"
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.theolivetree.webdavserver

- Ideally, you create a Network Drive on the Windows side ('Map network
drive' in File Explorer) with something like this in the 'Folder:' field:

http://192.168.0.124:8080

(WebDAV Server will tell you the IP address and port number for your
situation.)

I could not get this to work (Windows could not find the WebDAV
server), so I tried an alternative (to 'Map network drive'):

'NetDrive', free for 1 Network Drive, http://www.netdrive.net/.

- With NetDrive, I could map Network Drive S: to URL
http://192.168.0.124 and Port 8080 and do a Connect.
That showed the content of the phone's SD card as Windows drive S:.

N.B. NetDrive is not the final solution, but is just used for this
proof-of-concept (because 'Map network drive' didn.t work (for me)).

Hope this helps.

On 8/2/2017 9:16 PM, Roy Tremblay wrote:
It may be impossible, but in case it's possible, does anyone here know how
to get a Windows File Explorer Wi-Fi connection to Android to show photo
thumbnails?
https://s3.postimg.org/9xifx4mgz/android_icons.jpg

When I open the Windows File Explorer to the FTP URI on my Android phone
over the LAN, I can browse the entire file system of Android from / onward,
but there are no thumbnails viewed.

On Android, when I browse the file system, there are thumbnails, so,
Android thumbnails must be done differently than Windows thumbnails.

Any idea if it's possible to generate Windows-like thumbnails on Android so
that when we browse the Android file system from Windows, we can see
thumbnails instead of just file names?
https://s3.postimg.org/9xifx4mgz/android_icons.jpg

I don't access my Nexus from Windows via Wi-Fi but, over USB, thumbnails
show just fine just as if the files in DCIM were local. The thumbnails on
Windows don't depend on what is on the other end -- I can just a readily
see thumbnail from my Drobo or Notebook which are both Linux-based devices
using Windows Explorer. Again, I'm not using Wi-Fi for those either, both
being on the wired gigabit network. I can't imagine why Wi-Fi would act
differently than USB or Ethernet.

Can you just connect the phone to the Windows machine via USB one time to
see if it acts differently?

"Roy Tremblay" wrote

| Exactly what I was asking for!
| Does such an Android-to-Windows .thumbnail conversion exist?

You might try posting one of the files. If it's some
kind of cache library it might not work, but if
each thumbnail is a separate file then the extension
might just be a cutesy way to label a small JPG.

Big Al actually wrote:

And that's the point. Once on Windows, Windows takes over and does the
right job. As you copied, it was probably making thumbnails as it
went, that or when you opened the folder.

We completely understand each other, which I summarize as three things:
1. Photos on Android are viewed by Android the "Android .thumbnail way"
2. Photos on Windows are viewed on Windows the "Windows .thumbnail way"
3. When you mix one with the other, you no longer see thumbnails.

I got that. That was the original question. How to change that.

I don't really need Android to view Windows .thumbnails, but the hope is
that someone knows of a way for Windows to make use of Android .thumbnails.

Andy Burns actually wrote:

When explorer is displaying the contents of a windows folder, there's an
expectation that anything else updating the contents of the folder will
update the thumbnails cache file.

But if it's an FTP location, it could be updated by a non-windows
system, so there's no guarantee that a thumbnail file would even exist,
or be up to date, so rather than downloading every image to generate the
thumbnails, it's easiest to not bother.

I think we agree completely that Android does .thumbnails the "Android way"
while Windows does .thumbnails the "Windows way".

Hence, when Android is viewing Windows files over the LAN, it won't
understand the Windows .thumbnail way, and more to the point, when Windows
is viewing Android files over the LAN, Windows won't understand the
"Android way" - and - worse - the FTP protocol has no way of "sending over"
the Android way to Windows anyway.

So, I think, as stated in the first line of the OP:
"It may be impossible, but in case it's possible, does anyone here
know how to get a Windows File Explorer Wi-Fi connection to Android
to show photo thumbnails?"

I admit I don't really understand the Android .thumnail way nor do I
understand the Windows .thumbnail way, so I'm not a guy who can solve this.

Even worse, I *tried* a few times to copy and move the Android .thumbnails
directory over to Windows and vice versa, and now my Android phone will
take pictures, but no thumnails show up!

Serves me right for experimenting!
Luckily, I can factory reset the phone, but the takeaway is this:

1. I don't think anyone has ever asked this question anywhere before.
2. I don't think anyone understands the "Android .thumbnail way".
3. But even so, it's impossible.

On 2017-08-03 13:19, Roy Tremblay wrote:
Andy Burns actually wrote:

does anyone here know how
to get a Windows File Explorer Wi-Fi connection to Android to show photo
thumbnails?

It's not an Android issue, it's a Windows issue ...

When you browse *any* FTP server from Windows Explorer you don't get
thumbnails, just an icon for the file extension, no preview pane either
and fairly minimal info in the details pane, it's just the way it is.

Thanks for explaining that the lack of ability to see Android thumbnails on
Windows File Explorer is an FTP-protocol issue.

No, it is not an FTP-protocol issue at all. It is a Windows Explorer issue.

Windows explorer may not know that it is looking at an Android folder,
nor that there is a thumbnails info already there. It wants to use its
own format of thumbnails, as does any other software.


Yesterday I was looking at photos in my phone via FTP, using several
Linux file explorers. And they did display thumbnails just fine, but
they had to be generated, meaning that they had to download all the photos.

I simply had to enable a setting on each file browser telling to show
thumbnails on remote filesystems, and to limit the size of the file for
which this would be done to a reasonable value (if photo is bigger, it
doesn't generate the thumbnail).

Possibly Windows Explorer has a similar setting somewhere.


Note that it is possible that any file explorer doing this may store the
thumbnail information as another folder in the phone, using more space.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

On Sat, 5 Aug 2017 14:33:30 +0000 (UTC), Roy Tremblay
wrote:

Big Al actually wrote:

And that's the point. Once on Windows, Windows takes over and does the
right job. As you copied, it was probably making thumbnails as it
went, that or when you opened the folder.

We completely understand each other, which I summarize as three things:
1. Photos on Android are viewed by Android the "Android .thumbnail way"
2. Photos on Windows are viewed on Windows the "Windows .thumbnail way"
3. When you mix one with the other, you no longer see thumbnails.

I got that. That was the original question. How to change that.

I don't really need Android to view Windows .thumbnails, but the hope is
that someone knows of a way for Windows to make use of Android .thumbnails.

Have you tried Teamviewer?