Comparing iPhone & Kindle folders

[jfkelley]

I've seen several discussions that touch on this, but just wondered if there was a trick to mapping a drive letter to my Kindle device (Fire HDX) as seen in my "Computer" folder in Windows 7.

Or, is there another way for BC to "see" the folders I can see when I drill down into "Kindle -> Internal storage" using the windows "Computer" folder?

I recall encountering a similar problem when connecting my iPhone 4S (and wanting to compare my photo folders).

I tried copying the file specification from windows file Explorer into BC (the most logical thing I could think of to try), but BC didn't recognize it: "Computer\Kindle\Internal storage\Documents"

If windows file Explorer can show me a listing, why can't BC?

[Aaron]

Hello,

The issue is that newer Android devices (and the iPhone Photo library) use MTP as their protocol for browsing the device. BC3 currently only supports browsing a device that shows itself as a Drive letter, a Network share, or FTP. Adding MTP is on our wishlist, but in the meantime, you would need to access it as one of the supported methods. The Android app marketplace has a few apps that allow acting as an FTP server, which would then allow BC3 to connect as a client and access the server, as one option.

[jfkelley]

Thanks. I have "studied up on "MTP". I saw one description that said it was a way for a device to "serve up" files without interfering with its own r/w access to it's storage. I surmise that mapping a drive letter to such a device might interfere. I don't really understand why that is since the windows explorer that opens up on "Computer/kindle" seems to allow all that sort of access.

In any event, I'm pleased that MTP is on your wishlist. I'll watch for that (and will hope it will solve my iPhone problem as well). I'll also look around for an FTP app that Amazon allows in it's app store.

In the meantime, I'll sync my few Kindle files "by hand" and will use my fallback of storing ALL my iPhone images in a redundant staging folder on my laptop and use BC on that folder.

I love my BC3.

[Zoë]

When Windows shows your Kindle in Explorer it is doing a bunch of mapping behind the scenes that isn't performed for a normal file. For example, with a regular file you can open it, write a byte in the middle, and close it, and it takes effect immediately. MTP only supports reading or writing entire files, so if an application wants to do the same thing it needs to read the file into a temporary location, modify that location, and then write the entire thing back out. It is also possible to have multiple "files" with the same name on MTP because that's handled differently. From my own testing Android's MTP at least doesn't support opening more than one file at once, so if you want to copy a file from one place to another you likewise need to transfer the entire file to your hard drive and then transfer it back to the new name. It's a lot of quirky things like that; Explorer can handle it, but the drive based programming interface that apps like BC uses has its roots in DOS/Unix from 30 years ago, so it has assumptions that Windows can't easily fake in order to make it look like a drive letter.

In any case, work on it is progressing in the background, but certain other features are taking precedence right now.

Unfortunately, MTP support won't help with iPhones. Apple uses a proprietary protocol for that that only iTunes understands. It does use MTP for pictures so it can integrate with camera software and we'll show those once we finish support, but MP3s and use documents are all off limits. The two third-party applications I know of that do support it are iExplorer and MediaMonkey. iExplorer does provide a way to mount an iPhone as a drive letter, but I haven't used it and can't vouch for its safety when used in combination with BC.

[derschmidt]

Kindle shows up in "Data Compare" session but not others

So I notice that the Kindle shows up in a "Data Compare" session but no other types of sessions. If BC can access it one way, why not the other?

[Aaron]

Could we get a screenshot of the view you are accessing? It should show the same files as the other file views (Text, Picture, MP3, etc). BC2 also doesn't ship with a "Data Compare", but has a "Data Viewer" plug-in. Are you using BC2's Data Viewer, or BC3's Data Compare?

[jfkelley]

Aaron,
From what I've read, BC3 doesn't handle "MTP" which is how my Kindle Fire HDX is offering itself up (i.e., no disk letter possible). I also read that the Beta of BC4 supported "MTP". (I see that the Beta has expired, so I purchased and downloaded 4.0.1.)

What I can't figure out is: how do I now do a folder compare to backup my Kindle Fire HDX? I tried pasting into the source folder: "Computer\Kindle\Internal storage". That obviously isn't the right way to do it. What is?

WAIT WAIT WAIT:

SOLUTION FOUND: KINDLE! (After some fumbling around)

To backup your Kindle Fire HDX with Beyond Compare 4 (4.0.1+), use this for your source folder spec: "mtp://Kindle/Internal Storage".

I found this by using the browse button. Be sure your Kindle is on and logged in (might be smart to make sure it STAYS logged in). Be aware that it takes a long, long while to scan (MTP must be slow).

It found 39,484 files on my 1-year-old Kindle. I probably need to figure out which folders need backup and which don't (for restoring a replacement device -- which is sitting on my desk as I type this).

ALSO -
SOLUTION FOUND: IPHONE (Yay!!!)

To update your iPhone in Beyond Compare 4, try this spec for your source files: "mtp://my iphone name/Internal Storage/DCIM" (I found the value for "my iphone name" by looking on the left folder navigation pane Windows 7 File Explorer.) It does NOT show up in BC4 browse (unlike the Kindle). (You might like the Flatten option here.)