Android - Programmatically upload file to .NET server, with metadata

Question

I know this question seems a bit specific, but I would have thought it was a quite common scenario. My goal here is to upload an image (~8 mb) to a server. The server runs .NET (no php I believe), but not only do I need to upload the file, I need to pass some text information along with it. How would I do this? What would my client and server code look like?

Answer 1

I used .Net WebService to upload Database file. Similarly you can use it for Image Upload.

Project Link

Download this demo.

Add these files in that package.

1. OutputStream.java

package com.abhan.example;

public class OutputStream extends java.io.FilterOutputStream {

    public final static int ENCODE = 1;
    public final static int DO_BREAK_LINES = 8;
    private final static int MAX_LINE_LENGTH = 76;
    private final static byte NEW_LINE = (byte)'\n';
    private final static byte WHITE_SPACE_ENC = -5;
    private boolean encode;
    private int     position;
    private byte[]  buffer;
    private int     bufferLength;
    private int     lineLength;
    private boolean breakLines;
    private byte[]  b4;
    private boolean suspendEncoding;
    private int     options;
    private byte[]  decodabet;

    public OutputStream( java.io.OutputStream out ) {
        this( out, ENCODE );
    }

    public OutputStream( java.io.OutputStream out, int options ) {
        super( out );
        this.breakLines   = (options & DO_BREAK_LINES) != 0;
        this.encode       = (options & ENCODE) != 0;
        this.bufferLength = encode ? 3 : 4;
        this.buffer       = new byte[ bufferLength ];
        this.position     = 0;
        this.lineLength   = 0;
        this.suspendEncoding = false;
        this.b4           = new byte[4];
        this.options      = options;
        this.decodabet    = Base64.getDecodabet(options);
    }

    @Override
    public void write(int theByte) 
    throws java.io.IOException {
        if( suspendEncoding ) {
            this.out.write( theByte );
            return;
        }

        if( encode ) {
            buffer[ position++ ] = (byte)theByte;
            if( position >= bufferLength ) { 
                this.out.write( Base64.encode3to4( b4, buffer, bufferLength, options ) );
                lineLength += 4;
                if( breakLines && lineLength >= MAX_LINE_LENGTH ) {
                    this.out.write( NEW_LINE );
                    lineLength = 0;
                }
                position = 0;
            } 
        } else {
            if( decodabet[ theByte & 0x7f ] > WHITE_SPACE_ENC ) {
                buffer[ position++ ] = (byte)theByte;
                if( position >= bufferLength ) {
                    int len = Base64.decode4to3( buffer, 0, b4, 0, options );
                    out.write( b4, 0, len );
                    position = 0;
                }
            }   
            else if( decodabet[ theByte & 0x7f ] != WHITE_SPACE_ENC ) {
                throw new java.io.IOException( "Invalid character in Base64 data." );
            } 
        }   
    }  

    @Override
    public void write( byte[] theBytes, int off, int len ) 
    throws java.io.IOException {
        if( suspendEncoding ) {
            this.out.write( theBytes, off, len );
            return;
        }

        for( int i = 0; i < len; i++ ) {
            write( theBytes[ off + i ] );
        } 
    } 

    public void flushBase64() throws java.io.IOException  {
        if( position > 0 ) {
            if( encode ) {
                out.write( Base64.encode3to4( b4, buffer, position, options ) );
                position = 0;
            } 
            else {
                throw new java.io.IOException( "Base64 input not properly padded." );
            } 
        } 
    }  

    @Override
    public void close() throws java.io.IOException {
        flushBase64();
        super.close();
        buffer = null;
        out    = null;
    } 

    public void suspendEncoding() throws java.io.IOException  {
        flushBase64();
        this.suspendEncoding = true;
    } 

    public void resumeEncoding() {
        this.suspendEncoding = false;
    }
}

2. Utils.java

package com.abhan.example;

import java.io.BufferedInputStream;
import java.io.ByteArrayOutputStream;
import java.io.File;
import java.io.FileInputStream;
import java.io.FileNotFoundException;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStream;
import java.text.DateFormat;
import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;
import java.util.Calendar;
import java.util.GregorianCalendar;
import android.os.Environment;

public class Utils {

    public static boolean checkExternalStorageAvailable() {
        boolean mExternalStorageAvailable = false;
        String state = Environment.getExternalStorageState();
        if(state.equals(Environment.MEDIA_MOUNTED)) {
            mExternalStorageAvailable = true;
        } else if(state.equals(Environment.MEDIA_MOUNTED_READ_ONLY)) {
            mExternalStorageAvailable = false;
        } else if(state.equals(Environment.MEDIA_NOFS)) {
            mExternalStorageAvailable = false;
        } else if(state.equals(Environment.MEDIA_SHARED)) {
            mExternalStorageAvailable = false;
        } else if(state.equals(Environment.MEDIA_UNMOUNTABLE)) {
            mExternalStorageAvailable = false;
        } else if(state.equals(Environment.MEDIA_UNMOUNTED)) {
            mExternalStorageAvailable = false;
        } else if(state.equals(Environment.MEDIA_REMOVED)) {
            mExternalStorageAvailable = false;
        } 

        return mExternalStorageAvailable;
    }

    public static String dataDirectory() {
        String dataDir = null;
        if(checkExternalStorageAvailable()) {
            dataDir = Environment.getDataDirectory().getAbsolutePath();
        }
        return dataDir;
    }

    public static boolean createDirectory(final String dirName) {
        boolean isDirectoryCreated = false;
        if(checkExternalStorageAvailable()) {
            File dirFile = new File(dirName);
            if(!dirFile.exists()) {
                dirFile.mkdirs();
                isDirectoryCreated = true;
            }
        }

        return isDirectoryCreated;
    }

    public static boolean deleteDirectory(final String dirName) {
        boolean isDirectoryDeleted = false;
        if(checkExternalStorageAvailable()) {
            File dirFile = new File(dirName);
            if(!dirFile.exists()) {
                isDirectoryDeleted = false;
            } else {
                dirFile.delete();
                isDirectoryDeleted = true;
            }
        }

        return isDirectoryDeleted;
    }

    public static String todayDate(final String providedFormat) {
        String returnedDateString = null;
        try {
            Calendar calendar = new GregorianCalendar();
            DateFormat dateFormat = new SimpleDateFormat(providedFormat);
            returnedDateString = dateFormat.format(calendar.getTime());
        } catch (Exception e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }

        return returnedDateString;
    }

    public static byte[] convertDatabaseFileToArray(final String filePath) {
        InputStream inputStream = null;
        ByteArrayOutputStream byteOutputStream = null;
        try {
            inputStream = new BufferedInputStream(
                    new FileInputStream(new File(filePath)), 8192);
            byte[] buffer = new byte[8096];
            byteOutputStream = new ByteArrayOutputStream();
            int length = 0;
            while((length = inputStream.read(buffer)) != -1) {
                byteOutputStream.write(buffer, 0, length);
            }
            if(inputStream != null) {
                inputStream.close();
            }
            if(byteOutputStream != null) {
                byteOutputStream.flush();
                byteOutputStream.close();
            }
        } catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        } catch (IOException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
        return byteOutputStream.toByteArray();
    }
}

3. Base64.java

To download this file you can use GrepCode Search.

Encode Bytes / String according to your needs in Web Service using Base64 and pass it to your param.

In MainActivity.java change the following things.

final String filePath = Utils.dataDirectory() + File.separator + "data"
                + File.separator + MainActivity.this.getPackageName() 
                + File.separator + "databases" + File.separator + "My_DB";
final String todayDate = Utils.todayDate("Your_Preferred_Format");
final String param0 = "http://121.121.121.121/mWebService/Abhan.asmx";
final String param1 = "121.121.121.121";
final String param2 = "http://localhost/mWebService/UploadFile";
final String param3 = getTopOfHeader()
+ "<UploadFile xmlns=\"http://localhost/mWebService\">"
                + "<FileArray>" + Base64.encodeBytes(Utils.convertDatabaseFileToArray(filePath)) + "</FileArray>" 
                + "<Filename>" + todayDate + "_1234567890_My_DB.db" + "</Filename>" 
                + "<Number>1234567890</Number>" 
                + "</UploadFile>"
                + getBottomOfHeader();

In this demo I have used Local Service. Please change it to your Live or Local Web Service. Moreover, I also used created Database file in \data\data\databases\My_DB. You can remove unnecessary code.

Run the demo.

Thanks.