open in app bindings, how to change?

[Eli the Bearded]

For background, I use Xodo as my PDF reader of choice on my devices.
Currently I am using an Android 11 device. One day I was opening a web
link in Firefox Focus and it offered to let me open in Xodo, and I
picked that and checked the "make default" box. Only after the file
opened did I realize it was image/jpeg instead of application/pdf.
PDFs defaulting to Xodo is fine. Images not fine. Apparently they
decided to expand their app to open more files and I didn't know that
was part of a recent update.

I do not ever want to open image/* links in Xodo. Where is the
configuration to undo this? I've looked in the settings for default apps
and in the Xodo configuration and I haven't found anything.

I'm not against simply uninstalling Xodo and finding a different
non-Google PDF reader. This is a very unpleasant change.

Elijah
------
uses xpdf on desktop, but doesn't have X11 installed on the phone

[Robin Goodfellow]

Eli the Bearded <*@eli.users.panix.com> asked

> I do not ever want to open image/* links in Xodo.

On my Android 11 Samsung, this resets too much at once:
Settings > Apps > 3dots > Reset app preferences > Reset
Which resets:
Disabled apps
Notification restrictions for apps
Default apps
Background data restrictions for apps
Permission restrictions

For some reason, I didn't have a PDF reader set up on my new phone.
To test what mine was set up by default I downloaded a sample PDF.
<https://www.learningcontainer.com/sample-pdf-files-for-testing/>

To open the sample PDF my FileExplorer gave me the choice of
OneDrive, Samsung Notes, App Manager, Drive, Office,
Termux, & X-plore PDF

None of those are, I would think, bona-fide PDF readers.
I downloaded Adobe Acrobat but was dismayed to see the disclaimer:
"To personalize your experience and improve product features,
this app sends Adobe information about how you use it."
In Acrobat settings there was no way to turn that spying off.
I set NetGuard to deny Acrobat the Internet (both Wi-Fi and cellular data).
But something that doesn't spy on us would be a better PDF reader.

> Where is the configuration to undo this?

It's a good question of where all the app defaults are located.

Searching for the definitive answer found this as the first hit:
https://ostoday.org/apple/how-do-i-choose-which-app-opens-a-file-on-android.html
That first hit implies we're in trouble as the method they recommend stinks.

> I've looked in the settings for default apps
> and in the Xodo configuration and I haven't found anything.

I just looked about inside my Android 11 settings and on the net and I don't
see that Android has the concept of the file types which Windows has.
Win+I > Apps > Default apps > Choose default apps by {file type, protocol}

> I'm not against simply uninstalling Xodo and finding a different
> non-Google PDF reader. This is a very unpleasant change.

I ran a search in Aurora for a free ad free gsf free google free PDF reader.
My default search restricts results to ratings of 4+ & >1M downloads.
That (rather restrictive) search found only one app that met the filters.
EbookDroid PDF & DJVU Reader, highly customizable Android doc viewer
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.ebookdroid

When I opened a random PDF, that PDF came up instantly (after a disclaimer
that EBookDroid uses a muPDF library to view PDF files.

I loosened my Aurora filter from >1M downloads to 100K downloads.'
Two more 4+ rated PDF viewers then showed up in that search result:
3D PDF Reader, by Tech Soft 3D
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.techsoft3d.hps.pdf.reader

PDF File Download, by MadHouse
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.madhouseapps.pdfreader

Loosening further the 4+ rated apps from 100K downloads to 50K added:
Gealho PDF Reader by Zeon Corp
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.zeon.Gaaiho.Reader

Juggling to >10K downloads but dropping to a 3+ rating garnered:
PDF Reader for Android
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.pdfviewerforandroid.pdfviewer

Secure PDF Viewer by Daniel Micay
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.grapheneos.pdfviewer

Pdf Viewer Plus by GSnathan
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.gsnathan.pdfviewer

That's about as low as I go, but if I allowed "GSF" apps, there would be
many more, so I just filtered to a rating of 4.7+ & >1M downloads to get
ReadEra by Readera LLC
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.readera

When I drop that GSF filter to a rating of 4.5+ & >1M downloads, we get
Adobe Acrobat, by Adobe
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.adobe.reader

Xodo, by Xodo Technologies
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.xodo.pdf.reader

All Document Reader, by A1 Office Apps
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.rpdev.document.manager.reader.allfiles

Which is back where we started.

[Andy Burns]

Eli the Bearded wrote:

> I use Xodo as my PDF reader of choice on my devices.
> Currently I am using an Android 11 device. One day I was opening a web
> link in Firefox Focus and it offered to let me open in Xodo, and I
> picked that and checked the "make default" box. Only after the file
> opened did I realize it was image/jpeg instead of application/pdf.
> PDFs defaulting to Xodo is fine. Images not fine. Apparently they
> decided to expand their app to open more files and I didn't know that
> was part of a recent update.

I you go to settings, app, pick xodo, pick "open by default", you can
clear defaults for that one app, then launcher will re-ask you and maybe
you can just set it as default for pdf, rather than all supported types?

if it snaffles all file types again when you just want it to handle
pdfs, then I'd say it's time to give it a 1 star review and uninstall ...

[Eli the Bearded]

In comp.mobile.android, Andy Burns <use...@andyburns.uk> wrote:
> I you go to settings, app, pick xodo, pick "open by default", you can
> clear defaults for that one app, then launcher will re-ask you and maybe
> you can just set it as default for pdf, rather than all supported types?

App claims to handle 2 links.

[...]

App claims to handle following links:
app.xodo.com
*

> if it snaffles all file types again when you just want it to handle
> pdfs, then I'd say it's time to give it a 1 star review and uninstall ...

Yeah, I think that's the action needed now.

(WTF Android. "Default apps" and "Open by default"? Why the separation?)

Elijah
------
fortunately rarely needs to look at PDFs

[Robin Goodfellow]

Eli the Bearded <*@eli.users.panix.com> asked

> (WTF Android. "Default apps" and "Open by default"? Why the separation?)

Agree there should be Android defaults setting much like as with Windows.

Win+I > Apps > Default apps > Choose default apps by {file type, protocol}

It's easy to figure out why Apple wouldn't provide this for iOS.
But why doesn't Google provide the choice of a page of file-type defaults?

Dunno.