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Comment by sgt | Hacker News Reader

It's not really an AirDrop equivalent if it requires you to be on the same network. AirDrop is really useful when you're out and about somewhere and you want to send someone a file. In those cases there's possibly not a WiFi available or in the case of visitors to your home; only you are on the network, not your friend. So I would not see the point of using this instead of AirDrop unless you have to send a file to someone using Android.

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İ have an Android and a MBP. The number of times where İ think, "why is this so hard to get this file to that computer" is more than I'd like to admit.

Cloud drives (iCloud, OneDrive, GDrive) are all too slow on bad WiFi.

This should help me.

Have you tried Syncthing?

not the OP, I'm on Linux + Android and I hate my phone so much. next phone will be a pinephone and a DSLR or mirrorless camera at this rate.

the ONLY thing that's worked for me is syncthing -- I can't copy files over USB reliably at all.

I guess I could also pay for google photos but honestly fuck google so much. I have a pixel 3a so all I get is the unlimited low-res images.

Why the hell this thing can't just backup files over USB or SMB or a card reader/USB drive plugged in to usb-C is beyond me.

I have a Pinephone. Its incredible. We need more users. Buy one! The next generation is on it's way and it's supposed to be pretty awesome.

I have the reverse problem (win10 devices/iphone) and it has become enough of an issue to convince me to switch to android. Its ridiculous how Apple treats non apple devices as third-class citizens.

How would you send a file using Android (without access to an already existing network)? I asked someone with an Android phone the other day and apparently it's not practical.

WiFi direct - so long as the connecting devices support it and there's no requirement to be connected to the same WiFi network. Works a treat transferring from Android to Android or Windows 10 and it isn't proprietary.

The fact that someone would have to Google how to do this is what Windows is lacking. I built a hackintosh and bought an iPhone after I got tired of those disparities and disconnections. Why can’t Windows just work with Android already?

For Windows 10 yes, but for Android it's in the share context menu, so easy to use in fact that my mum and dad have been using it for years to send each other videos and pictures of trips and outings at blazing fast speeds, for them it's just magic as it works and they don't need to understand what's happening under the hood or fulfil any technical prereqs.

I have a Lenovo Android device here for testing purposes, fairly new (runs Android 9). Could not find anything like that in the UI.

When sending, it should appear under the share menu when you share something and to receive you just need to go on WiFi direct which can be opened under the WiFi screen.

I use the VLC iPhone/iPad app to transfer files. There is an option to show the files on your iPhone/iPad as a webserver which works on any device that has a browser (you have to be on the same network).

Fair warning about this method: It will transfer the file just fine, it is depending on iPadOS recognizing there is a file somewhere else. If you are using it for watching video files, you will have to use VLC since iPad video app will not see the file. I tried to use the iPad to watch my video collection (Plex and Emby required paid app for streaming to the iPad), it does weird thing with them. Some of the video file (in MKV, encoded with various format [x264 and HEVC]) will load the video just fine, it will have problem seeking and missing subs (it is already in the container), dropped audios and stuff. I thought my video files is the problem and i tested them in PC and my Note 8, it ran just fine. I would believe it is something to do with iPad OS, PC and Android VLC played the video without issues.

Yes Android -> MBP has been a consistent pain for me. I just tried this out and it worked perfectly, I think this is great.

If you want a bit more features than just file sharing (like clipboard sync or music control), I highly recommend KDE connect.

One option is to use X-plore, a seriously well featured file manager app for Android. If both devices are on the same wi-fi network, which I pretty much always am when I need to do this, in a couple of taps you can use its "WiFi file sharing" mode which lets any device with a browser address a file manager, view and download files. The docs don't really do it justice - https://www.lonelycatgames.com/docs/xplore/wifi-share/in-web

I think you are looking for https://webwormhole.io/

Interesting, what's the performance like?

Alas, this is a general issue with WebRTC: Most people are behind NATs[1], and not even STUN[2] can save them. In order for this to support internetwork (heh) transport, you'd need a TURN[3] server that could relay the traffic between the participants. Of course, at that point you're not really Peer2Peer anymore: You have a server between you and that server is going to cost actual money to run.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_address_translation [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STUN [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traversal_Using_Relays_around_...

This made me curious about the state of IPv6 adoption.

About 33% of folks have IPv6 connectivity now, up from 5% in 2015.[1]

The NAT problem isn't going away anytime soon, but it's good to see some progress is finally being made on that front.

[1]: https://www.google.com/intl/en/ipv6/statistics.html#tab=ipv6...

Majority of people want to use Airdrop to share file in same network in my experience.

Sometimes difficult when devica A is using a corporate wifi and device B uses a public wifi/mobile data

Definitely not true for me. My most common scenario is "can you please send me all the photos of the trip/dinner/... in the original resolution" in a car park/train station/street corner.

iCloud album link?

Please no. The recipient does not actually “have” the photo when it is sent.

but they have the option to download (with the iCloud share link, not shared album).

I suspect most people use AirDrop for the use case where a bunch of folks are physically somewhere together, perhaps on a trip or having coffee, and someone asks: "hey, can you quickly send me that video?". Without Airdrop that isn't always feasible: 1) a WiFi network may not be available to send using other means 2) perhaps the video is very large and would eat your data 3) no cell reception at all, as is common on adventure or hiking trips

this issue is solvable with relay server

there's no means for your devices to find/discover each other in the real world

To be fair, AirDrop requires you to be on the same network as well, as otherwise the devices don't have any way of communicating. If you're already on the same WiFi, it'll use WiFi but if not, it'll connect to each other via Bluetooth (eg, connecting to the same network [a network of two devices]), but the setup of the connection is automatic.

Maybe Snapdrop can do something similar with the new Bluetooth Web APIs.

False. AirDrop does discovery via bluetooth, but then sets up an ad-hoc WiFi connection directly between devices to transmit data. No network required.

> sets up an ad-hoc WiFi connection ... No network required.

It does need a network, that's why it creates one using an ad-hoc WiFi connection.

The creation of this ad hoc network is seamless, invisible to the user, and doesn’t require _external_ network hardware.

> False

> sets up an ad-hoc WiFi connection

> No network required

Guess we have different definitions of what a "network" is. I'd call that a network, of two devices.

I think the important difference is that AirDrop doesn't require you both to start on the same network for discovery, which SnapDrop does.

That Airdrop sets up its own temporary network hidden from view is not really relevant to most users though. For the user, it just works like "magic". All you need are two phones.

That was the initial version of AirDrop that had the same network requirement; future releases negotiated an adhoc wifi connection over bluetooth then used that.

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