Displaying external files in Google Chrome

[EdiMike]

This is a question about the Android version of Google Chrome rather than Android itself. Apologies if I am posting it in the wrong place.

I am using Chrome version 36.0 under Android 4.1.2.

My problem occurs when I click a link in Chrome to view or play an external file, for example, to watch a video, play some music, or read a PDF. Whenever I do that, the file is saved to some location in the device's memory. I then have to fire up my file browsing app, laboriously drill down to the relevant location (assuming I can find it), and then launch the relevant app to read or play the file.

Is there a better way?

On my Windows PC, when I click on a link to an external file, the browser simply opens and plays the file for me. Depending on the file type, it might do that within the browser itself, or it might automatically launch another application. Either way, it does so without any further interaction on my part.

I was just wondering if I could get the browser to act in that way on my Android device.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Mike

 

[SpookDroid]

Unfortunately, there is no way to do that. The reason it works that way in your PC is because you have the appropriate reader app (in this case, Adobe Acrobat, I'm assuming) and it installs a plugin so that your browser can recognize these files and display them inside the browser, but using Adobe Acrobat to actually do the displaying (Chrome is really just acting like a container, and the actual translation is being done by Adobe's software). On the mobile version, you don't have this kind of plugin available.

Only if you were to see a file in a webpage that's got an HTML5-enabled viewer, like the GMail site (as long as you're viewing the Desktop version) or Office365, then the webpage itself is displaying the file and it's not being saved onto your device.

 

[EdiMike]

Thanks very much for the prompt reply, SpookDroid. It's a bit of a nuisance that I can't do it, but it's not the end of the world.

The worst thing was that, when I first used Android, I didn't realise what was going on. When I clicked on the link, nothing appeared to happen, and I assumed that something had gone wrong. I only discovered the downloaded files by accident. It's a pity that the browser doesn't at least give some feedback or some sort of message to advise you where to look for the file. But not to worry. At least I know now.

Mike

 

[SpookDroid]

It actually should! It's not the best way to do it IMHO, but it does display a message on your notification bar, and it should let you click on it to take you to the Downloads folder.

 

[EdiMike]

it does display a message on your notification bar, and it should let you click on it to take you to the Downloads folder.

Aha, you're right. It does indeed display a notification, and it does let you click through to the document. I never never noticed that before. I must get into the habit of looking at the notification bar more often.

Many thanks,

Mike