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How do I "Save As" a file?

  • 4 replies
  • 9 have this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by gerv

gerv
gerv
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Scenario: I used Barcode Scanner to scan the barcode for some software (an Android .apk) file. It offered me: - Email to someone - SMS to someone - Open in browser

So I did the third. It then asked me: "Native browser or Firefox?". The native browser hands these off to the Market.

Expected Result: I assumed Firefox would do the same. Result: Firefox displays it as a big block of ugly text.

And there's no "Save As" function so I can save it to disk and open it from there! Where is the Save As function? I don't want to save as a PDF, I just want to save the file as I downloaded it.

(For bonus points, please also tell me how to alter file associations.)

Scenario: I used Barcode Scanner to scan the barcode for some software (an Android .apk) file. It offered me: - Email to someone - SMS to someone - Open in browser So I did the third. It then asked me: "Native browser or Firefox?". The native browser hands these off to the Market. Expected Result: I assumed Firefox would do the same. Result: Firefox displays it as a big block of ugly text. And there's no "Save As" function so I can save it to disk and open it from there! Where is the Save As function? I don't want to save as a PDF, I just want to save the file as I downloaded it. (For bonus points, please also tell me how to alter file associations.)

Chosen solution

Sorry, there's no "Save Page As" command in the mobile Firefox menu. If you know a web page with a link to the file, you can press-and-hold on the link and choose "Save Link."

Normally Firefox would automatically save an APK file and let you install it, but this requires the web server to send the correct "Content-type" header. Some web servers do not send the header, and the Firefox doesn't know about the file type. We'll try to improve this experience in future versions.

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All Replies (4)

Matt Brubeck
Matt Brubeck
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Chosen Solution

Sorry, there's no "Save Page As" command in the mobile Firefox menu. If you know a web page with a link to the file, you can press-and-hold on the link and choose "Save Link."

Normally Firefox would automatically save an APK file and let you install it, but this requires the web server to send the correct "Content-type" header. Some web servers do not send the header, and the Firefox doesn't know about the file type. We'll try to improve this experience in future versions.

gerv
gerv Question owner
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Hi mbrubeck,

Thanks for the quick reply :-)

Is the removal (or non-implementation) of this function a deliberate design decision?

If you have Save Link, there's obviously not an objection to the general principle of saving pages as HTML (as opposed to, say, PDF). So what's the problem with Save Page As?

Indeed, the server seems to send it as text/plain. Have the controls for associating file extensions with MIME types been removed? It doesn't seem that there are any OS-level ones you could delegate to...

Matt Brubeck
Matt Brubeck
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"Save As" was not left out because of anything specific against that feature - it's just that mobile Firefox has a fairly minimal user interface, and we have been slow to add any new features (in an attempt to keep the interface uncluttered and usable). Often we write add-ons so that users who miss them can add these extra features. I may do this for "Save Page As" if it's not added to a future version of Fennec.

We do delegate to Android's OS-level MIME type handling. Every Android app registers a list of file types it can handle, and the OS will pop up a dialog asking you to choose an app (and offering to set a default). You can select an app and press "Clear defaults" in Android's "Manage Applications" settings if you want to change the default later.

Modified by Matt Brubeck

gerv
gerv Question owner
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I guess I can't blame you for the braindead design of Android's MIME type handling. In order to fix one mis-directed MIME type, I have to clear the entire list of associated types I may have spent a long time building up! Particularly for Firefox, an application designed to handle quite a few types, that's pretty broken...

Thank you for your help :-)