Re-gain write permission when upgrading to ICS 4.x

[blueeagle69]

Thanks to mek who posted the url.

Right then guys.
From Honeycomb onwards a new permission was set.
The owner group of the External SD card is set as media_rw.
Prior to Honeycomb 3.2, apps did not require this permission in order to write to /mnt/extsd (as it's called now).
But with Honeycomb onwards, many apps saw this owner group, and didn't recognise it. So the external memory card was mounted as read-only.
This is why, the stock file manager, is able to write to /mnt/extsd as it recognises that media_rw permission.
So, taken from that website, do the following.

Using Android Commander (as it's easier). Navigate to /system/etc/permissions, and pull or drag and copy the platform.xml to your PC (make a note of the permissions before you do-so).
Outside of Android Commander, navigate to where you copied platform.xml, and open it with Wordpad, or some other XML editor.
Find the permission WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE permission, and add a new group below.
paste this

Code: Select all

<group gid="media_rw" />

Save and copy the file back to the tablet, reset the permissions (644) I believe, and lastly reboot the tablet.
I tested ES File Explorer, switched off root options, and was able to write to /mnt/extsd
Now I will try DirectoryBind again.

Now apps that did not normally need the media_rw permission should now write as normal.

[Charlie]

@blueeagle69 Nice find, thanks for sharing. As for the permissions (644) - is that how that file was set before?

[blueeagle69]

Yes mate it was. Or at least I think it was.
Just double-check with Android Commander before you overwrite.

Thanks goes to @mek for posting the url.

I just tested DirectoryBind. And it is now able to create directories again

[suggsy89]

Camera still works using this hack?
Im testing a different version atm, and tried it, but it tells me to insert a sdcard when i already have one it in
Strange

[blueeagle69]

I just tested the Camera and it seems to be fine.
I recorded a quick vid of my ugly mug, and it saved it fine etc.

[justb]

Just one question, how do I reset the permissions (644)???

[blueeagle69]

Use Android Commander.
When the file has been pushed back to the excel' right click the file and select proprties.
Then untick or tick boxes until you get that number.
But like I said double check what the permissions are by doing the same thing, before you overwrite it.

Sent from my Scroll Excel/Nexus S using Tapatalk.

[justb]

Tried Android Commander, you have to install a lot of stuff and was getting nowhere.

I just downloaded ES file explorer, and enabled root and made system writeable, was able to open the permissions.xml and edit it. Saved it and changed the permissions to what they were before (rw-r--r--) and I think it's worked.

Asphalt 6 was not saving my game, every time i'd play it would go back to only 9% completed when I had got to 18%.

After changing it, just played, got to 10%, exited, rebooted, went back in, 10% complete!

[justb]

Confirmed working, I was wondering why I was running out of space with half the apps from before...

Uninstalled and reinstalled shadowgun and it's now on the eternSD