How do I transfer files from Android cellphone

[Bret Busby]

On 10/08/2019, Karl Auer <kauer at biplane.com.au> wrote:
> On Sat, 2019-08-10 at 18:14 +0800, Bret Busby wrote:
>> I have an Android cellphone that I connect to my UbuntuMATE 18.04
>> computer via USB tethering, and, use that for accessing the WWW on
>> that computer.
>>
>> On my cellphone, I have a number of image files (screenshots) that I
>> want to transfer to the computer.
>>
>> Rather than attaching each file to a gmail email message composed on
>> the cellphone, and, sending a copy of the file, for downloading to
>> the computer, how do I direcly transfer the files?
>
> Hey Bret
>
> The phone can be different USB devices - it can be a modem or a memory
> stick, a "media device" (MTP) or a camera (PTP). Some phone can be even
> more things. Generally you can choose in Settings what you want the
> connected phone to be; the commonest default is for it to be a memory
> stick.
>
> If you use the phone as a modem (USB tethering), you can't
> simultaneously use it as any other USB device (except that it might be
> able to charge at the same time).
>
> So provided you can do without the Internet for a bit, go into Settings
> and turn off the USB tethering. The phone will typically revert to
> being a memory stick by default. It might give you other options, like
> MTP and PTP, just leave them be. Mine works fine for USB file transfer
> with "MTP" selected.
>
> Depending on your Linux setup, when you turn off tethering the phone
> should show up just as if you had plugged in a USB memory stick. If it
> doesn't, try unplugging and re-plugging the USB cable. Or do whatever
> you usually do to mount and use the contents of a USB memory stick.
>
> When you are done, turn tethering back on to get back to the Internet.
>
> Regards, K.
>
> PS: Just for fun, try plugging USB devices into the phone - most
> Android phones will happily recognise mice, keyboards, USB memory
> sticks and so on. You might need an adapter as most phones have USB-C
> or micro-USB rather than the USB-A on most PC devices.
>
> --
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>
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Hello.

Thank you for that.

I should probably have initially stated that the cellphone is a
Motorola g6 Play, running Android v9.

Using the above, as a guide, below is the procedure that I followed (I
hope that it is portrayed sufficiently clearly)

First, I switched off the USB tethering. Then, ...

"Settings" ->
"Connected devices" -> "USB" selected (under heading "Currently connected")
"USB preferences" ->
"Use USB for"
("No data transfer" checked by default; unchecked, then
"File transfer" checked)

And the caja file manager then automatically opened a new window for
the cellphone file directory hierarchy, as if I had inserted a USB
thumb drive (which, I assume, was emulated), and I then went to the
particular images directory (Screenshots), and cut and pasted the
files that I wanted transferred, and the transfer was pretty much
instantaneous.

I then stepped back through the procedure, reverting to the previous settings.

I have set this out here, to both show that the problem is solved,
and, included the steps, in case someone else, with the same Android
version, wants to know how to do this.

Thank you for your help.

-- 
Bret Busby
Armadale
West Australia
..............

"So once you do know what the question actually is,
 you'll know what the answer means."
- Deep Thought,
 Chapter 28 of Book 1 of
 "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:
 A Trilogy In Four Parts",
 written by Douglas Adams,
 published by Pan Books, 1992

....................................................