Back in February, Google made a decision that upset a lot of users by limiting access to the SD card by developers. As of Lollipop, those limitations get a lot less limiting.
As Android Police notes, Google's adding new APIs that allow developers a
lot more control over where and how files are stored on the SD card
while simultaneously making the interaction as effortless as possible on
the end user. You can read about the specifics at the source link, but
here's the important takeaway for the average user:
All put together, this should be enough to alleviate most of the stress
related to SD cards after the release of KitKat. Power users will no
longer have to deal with crippled file managers, media apps will have
convenient access to everything they should regardless of storage
location, and developers won't have to rely on messy hacks
to work around the restrictions. Of course, these features are still
specifically a part of Android 5.0 (and above), so it'll be a while
until these benefits can truly materialize. At least we can all rest
easy knowing that the future of Android does not involve dooming the SD
card to obscurity – it's actually balancing usability and security.
When we posted about the previous limits, many users expressed their
disdain. Hopefully this will alleviate some of those concerns.
Ultimately the end result should be more secure, more powerful, and less
confusing file management for all.
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