Is there a way to prevent - Vibrant Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Is there a way to prevent certain pictures and videos from appearing in the gallery?
Also can I lock apps to prevent their use.
On my sisters phone the video player says that avatar is locked.

Most of the apps in the market to hide stuff do little more than hide the file by adding a dot to the beginning of the filename and/or changing the file extension to txt. This will hide it from the gallery and video player, but it still will be visible to any good file manager.
The locked thing on Avatar might be due to DRM.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

Vibrantthing said:
Is there a way to prevent certain pictures and videos from appearing in the gallery?
Also can I lock apps to prevent their use.
On my sisters phone the video player says that avatar is locked.
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like what t313 said...just add a dot/period (.) in front of the file/folder name. i found that windows doesnt allow me to add a dot ,so i use my file manager(Astro PRO) on my phone to manually rename.
basically your phones gallery will ignore anything with a dot in front of the name. on my phone, i have a folder called .hide. thats where i put files that i want hidden

brian_v3ntura said:
like what t313 said...just add a dot/period (.) in front of the file/folder name. i found that windows doesnt allow me to add a dot ,so i use my file manager(Astro PRO) on my phone to manually rename.
basically your phones gallery will ignore anything with a dot in front of the name. on my phone, i have a folder called .hide. thats where i put files that i want hidden
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Just remember that brian_v3ntura said to use a file manager to add the dot, and so by extension this "hidden" folder will not show up in the gallery (or anything that respects hidden files and folders) but will still show up in most decent file mangers.
If you girlfreind/wife/parents/mountain goat happen to snoop around using the file manager they might find that folder you named ".HardCoreDonkeyPorn" so even though security through obscurity almost never works out, it might still help a little to name it something like ".sbin" instead.
One of the reasons to avoid the market programs is because there "hidden" folders stand out a bit when they are named something like ".HiddenFolder" or ".MyVault"
Just something to keep in mind. The long and short of it is, if you don't want CSI to finds it, don't put it on the phone at all.

T313C0mun1s7 said:
Just remember that brian_v3ntura said to use a file manager to add the dot, and so by extension this "hidden" folder will not show up in the gallery (or anything that respects hidden files and folders) but will still show up in most decent file mangers.
If you girlfreind/wife/parents/mountain goat happen to snoop around using the file manager they might find that folder you named ".HardCoreDonkeyPorn" so even though security through obscurity almost never works out, it might still help a little to name it something like ".sbin" instead.
One of the reasons to avoid the market programs is because there "hidden" folders stand out a bit when they are named something like ".HiddenFolder" or ".MyVault"
Just something to keep in mind. The long and short of it is, if you don't want CSI to finds it, don't put it on the phone at all.
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actually astrology file manager ad supported version and the PRO version has a setting to hide hidden files so it doesn't show up in the file manager until u reenable in settings. or just create a zip file using astro then hide

brian_v3ntura said:
actually astrology file manager ad supported version and the PRO version has a setting to hide hidden files so it doesn't show up in the file manager until u reenable in settings. or just create a zip file using astro then hide
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I did not know this because I don't use it. Does it just create the dot files we mentioned, or does it actually do something special like encrypt it? If it just becomes a dot file then it will still be visible to another file manager, like say root explorer.
Dot files are a standard way to create "hidden" files in Unix and Linux and it goes back over 40 years. The issue is that it fully relies on programs to respect the setting. Even the ls command will show hidden files if you just add the -a switch.

Ty for the tips. One of the things that I wanted hide from the gallery was some apps had their pics show up in the gallery which to me is annoying plus some random album art too. Plus not having to worry about showing pics in gallery to family with some random katy perry pics and gifs is good too.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

Vibrantthing said:
Ty for the tips. One of the things that I wanted hide from the gallery was some apps had their pics show up in the gallery which to me is annoying plus some random album art too. Plus not having to worry about showing pics in gallery to family with some random katy perry pics and gifs is good too.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
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Then for these casual cases to hide images, the dot hidden will work just fine for you. I do this to hide all my eBook covers from the gallery. For album art, I just embed it in the ID3 tags. I think it is both cleaner and it makes sure the metadata (in this case album art) travels with the file itself, which is exactly what the ID3 tag is for.

The ".nomedia" file in the directory will keep the media scanner from finding anything. That works to keep random junk out of the gallery - but isn't a "hidden" solution.
-bZj

Related

[Q] How can I hide pictures

I've been searching all over and I havnt found any related threads regarding hiding pictures on the vibrant. I have some pictures that i want to hide but i cannot find any info on how to accomplish this. I've tried a few apps that supposedly did it but i really didnt like how they worked. If anyone has any suggestions on how to accomplish this task please share!
thanks!
You can always just create a zip file using Astro. From there move the pictures within the zip file.
Don't know why you'd want to but that should work as the regular file system/programs don't recognize zip files.
I dont want my kids to accidently stumble across certain pictures if they pick up my phone. I was hoping there was a way to rename a directory or a place that the gallery doesnt look in.
If you rename the folder with your porn pics by putting a dot in front of the folder name then that folder will be hidden. It would hide it from the gallery viewer and what not as well as from the regular file system. To access it again you'd have to use a file manager program like Astro or Root Explorer where you can navigate to those hidden folders. From there you can just enter them and click on the pictures you want to view then but you won't have the porn picture flip or scroll capability like in gallery view...
you can also add a ".nomedia" (without quotes) file to hide them too.. not sure if it works in Gallery but I know it works for music. I use it to keep my ringtones and notifications out of the music player.
TheExpertNoob said:
you can also add a ".nomedia" (without quotes) file to hide them too.. not sure if it works in Gallery but I know it works for music. I use it to keep my ringtones and notifications out of the music player.
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Works in Gallery because I forgot I created one and I got really frustrated trying to figure out why my phone would scan files, but would never show up in gallery. LOL
I downloaded Pandora and it does a great job of hiding pictures and videos, plus it is password protected. It has a picture of a box not to be confused with Pandora music app.
Thanks guys I added a period before the folder name using Root Explorer and after a reboot it is now hidden from the gallery... exactly what i was looking for
Woohoo! The porn is safe!

[Q] Photo album app problems again

I`ve tried all the photo album apps on the market, and all of them for some reason scan the whole device searching for images. As a result it grabs all CD covers I have stored along with muisc, and shows it in the album. I HATE it. Why do I need CD covers mixed with my album photos?????
Does anyone know a photo album app which can be instructed to search for photos only in a specific folder?
I had the same problem but I don't think there is a way around it. What I ended up doing was using 'picture folder' app for photos and then 'doubletwist' for music and deleting all of the cover images from the music folders as doubletwist can get the cover art from the ID tag of the files.
Only really helpful if your OCD like me and make sure all your musics ID tags are correct
Picture Folder has a feature of hiding folder
Picture Folder has a feature of hiding folder .
Hide your music folder, and recursively hides all subfolders under it.
So won't see any album arts.
Just a work around
I have finally found a program which works on a folder basis and on which one can set the home folder. It is called PiQu. Unfortunately this is a paid application, but since it works exactly as expected, i don`t mind paying 2 euros for it.
i use justpictures which allows you to select folders on your local drive and also syncs with facebook. and it's free!
chupachup said:
i use justpictures which allows you to select folders on your local drive and also syncs with facebook. and it's free!
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Again - it scans ALL folders, and shows ALL pictures. There is no way to define which is the pictures folder by default, and stop scanning other folders (except for adding.nomedia file which has to be done manually). Also I prefer to see thumbnails as thumbnails and not as a deck of playing cards on the table.
Use 3d Gallery 2.0. You can find it here on Xda or google.
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sascha6982 said:
Use 3d Gallery 2.0. You can find it here on Xda or google.
Sent from my E10i using XDA App
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3d gallery has same problem. It scans all folders on SD.
Just use " Picture Folder" works great!

Hide Pics

In the Amazon Apps thread the free app today is PhotoVault. Someone reported an issue with the app, so I thought I would point this out as an easy way to hide pics (most of you already know this, apologies if you do).
The video goes on and on, basically you just go to the folder in the DCIM folder and add a period in front of the folder name.... any photo you do not want to show in your gallery (for whatever reason) just add to this folder, or rename multiple folders. You can still access the files using your file manager.

[Q] .nomedia or dot doesn't work in the gallery

Does anyone a the solution to the problem where the gallery just indexes nearly everything it finds? i've placed .nomedia files in folders, i've tried putting a dot in front of the folders (which did make them 'invisible' for file explorer) which also worked for a couple of days, but suddenly gallery started to index even these .name folders.
Does anyone know how to fix this? it's pretty stupid that there is no include/exclude folder option or anything.
Use quickpic and disable the gallery. That's what I did.
You can also install audio manager and do it that way.
Theres only one way that works.
SexyAndIKnowIt said:
Does anyone a the solution to the problem where the gallery just indexes nearly everything it finds? i've placed .nomedia files in folders, i've tried putting a dot in front of the folders (which did make them 'invisible' for file explorer) which also worked for a couple of days, but suddenly gallery started to index even these .name folders.
Does anyone know how to fix this? it's pretty stupid that there is no include/exclude folder option or anything.
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This is only for music and the indexing of every single bit of album art that the Gallery Pics up, but in most casesthat's the biggest annoyance:
I have tried Gallery Replacements like QuickPic, and they are decent, but I want things to work the way I want them, not to just replace them with an alternative. Hers the only way that I know that works:
You need to have only one Album Cover picture per folder (assuming all your music is in folders) Name it albumart.jpg all lowercase; AlbumArt.jpg will not work (he says after naming DOZENS that way, LOL! It is time consuming, but only needs to be done once, preferably on the PC, where a major file cleanup/renaming operation goes a little faster.
Then just use Cover Art Downloader from the market for all future adds to your music files (it creates the correct filename) and you are set.
This is a known ICS bug. It has been submitted to google for fixing. Sorry I don't have the link to the bug report but a google search should work to find it.
It happens when the media scanner scans a folder prior to a .nomedia file being created. Once media scanner determines there is media in a folder it will forever ignore the .nomedia file.
A fix is to add the .nomedia files to whatever folders you don't want scanned then clear data for the media scanner (and possibly gallery too, although I think a reboot will remove the extra thumbnails).
I'm not sure how your media scanner is scanning your .folders, but whatever. Hopefully clearing media storage will fix that too.
I use the .nomedia trick & it seems to work. Maybe I placed them before the media scanner indexed them?
For example the app Bookworm makes thumbs of all the book covers - and I have 250 - and use this trick to stop them from showing up.
The .nomedia file has to be the first file in a folder in order to ignore media there. If files are already indexed, just rename such folders forth and back (opening the Gallery in the middle) and there you go.
You can use the Nomedia application for creating easily the .nomedia

[Q] How to hide images from gallery

Hello
I currently have a HTC EVO 3D, and on that phone I am able to create a folder named ".story" in my file manager app, and all the pictures i put in there will not be shown in the gallery app. Works very nicely and exactly how i want it to.
Now onto my issue.
I tried to do the same on my Prime, creating the folder, putting the exact same images in that folder (all from dropbox, syncing it to my comp, phone and tablet).
But the images still show up in the gallery app.
I also tried to put a file named ".nomedia" in the folder where i keep all my pictures, still didn't work.
I tried rebooting several times to see if i had to force a media rescan, but it seems like it didn't work.
I'm running .21 update, stock, with root.
Am i missing something, or doesn't this work on the prime? If so, any other way to do so? (I don't want to use a "vault" app to hide pictures and such)
- Moon
I had the same problem a few weeks ago. Try the app Hide it Pro. It's free on the Play Store and does pretty much what your asking for. It also works with videos, Docs and apps.
Sorry can't post links yet!
Edit: oops sorry, I didn't read the full post
it is annoying
You are not alone, naming the folder with a initial . and creating a .nomedia file does not work for me either, and I find it annoying. Clearing Gallery cache did not help either.
Works just fine, ".foldername" with a .nomedia file in it. Does for me at least, hides it from gallery and from the built in file manager. ES file explorer picks it up but it's at that point you're not hiding anything
EDIT: Try making a file on your computer, right click and New>File, name it .nomedia, then DropBox (that's a sign up link, you'd help me out as well as yourself by using it) it. Download it and copy/pasta to the folder. That's how I did it, because a guide I read said it worked better if from the PC instead of through Android.
If you're trying to hide a whole trove of things, make a folder and name it ".foldername" and then put your hidden folder in there and name it ".foldername2", then drop a .nomedia into .foldername and .foldername2 as well, doubling up on that.
I wouldn't recommend that with app picture caches though
If you are up for using a different Gallery app, you can whitelist and blacklist folders to be displayed in QuickPic
garbagedump481 said:
Works just fine, ".foldername" with a .nomedia file in it. Does for me at least, hides it from gallery and from the built in file manager. ES file explorer picks it up but it's at that point you're not hiding anything
EDIT: Try making a file on your computer, right click and New>File, name it .nomedia, then DropBox (that's a sign up link, you'd help me out as well as yourself by using it) it. Download it and copy/pasta to the folder. That's how I did it, because a guide I read said it worked better if from the PC instead of through Android.
If you're trying to hide a whole trove of things, make a folder and name it ".foldername" and then put your hidden folder in there and name it ".foldername2", then drop a .nomedia into .foldername and .foldername2 as well, doubling up on that.
I wouldn't recommend that with app picture caches though
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I did as you suggested, and it friggin worked! AWESOME!, mucho love to you
Now my files on my tablet is in a folder named ".story", inside that is a folder named "story" with a ".nomedia" file in it, and inside the "story" folder are all my pictures. (I made the ".nomedia" file on Windows, dropboxed it over to my Android Tablet (I made a new .txt document, removed the .txt and just named it ".nomedia" if anyone is wondering)).
After you try it, be sure to reboot your tablet, as that forces a media rescan

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