open failed: ENOENT (No such file or directory) Unable to get correct URI format

Question

I am trying out Retrofit POST using instructions provided here. The post recommends using and very old file picker as follows.

//https://github.com/iPaulPro/aFileChooser/blob/master/aFileChooser/src/com/ipaulpro/afilechooser/utils/FileUtils.java
// use the FileUtils to get the actual file by uri
File file = FileUtils.getFile(this, fileUri);

Instead of that I decided to use intent to get the file using the code below.

uploadButton.setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() {
    @Override
    public void onClick(View view) {
        Intent intent = new Intent();
        intent.setType("image/*");
        intent.setAction(Intent.ACTION_GET_CONTENT);
        startActivityForResult(Intent.createChooser(intent, "Select Picture"), PICK_IMAGE_REQUEST);
    }
});


@Override
    public void onActivityResult(int requestCode, int resultCode, Intent data) {
        super.onActivityResult(requestCode, resultCode, data);

        if (requestCode == PICK_IMAGE_REQUEST && resultCode == Activity.RESULT_OK
                && data != null && data.getData() != null) {
            Uri fileUri = data.getData();

            Log.d(LOG_TAG, "fileUri " + fileUri.toString());

            try {
                File file = new File(fileUri.getPath());
                Log.d(LOG_TAG, "file " + file.toString());
                // create RequestBody instance from file
                RequestBody requestFile =
                        RequestBody.create(MediaType.parse("multipart/form-data"), file.getAbsoluteFile());

                // MultipartBody.Part is used to send also the actual file name
                MultipartBody.Part body =
                        MultipartBody.Part.createFormData("picture", file.getName(), requestFile);

                // add another part within the multipart request
                String descriptionString = "POINT(12.9085608 77.6106535)";

                RequestBody location =
                        RequestBody.create(
                                MediaType.parse("multipart/form-data"), descriptionString);

                // finally, execute the request
                Call<ResponseBody> call = mAbService.uploadImage(location, body);
                call.enqueue(new Callback<ResponseBody>() {
                    @Override
                    public void onResponse(Call<ResponseBody> call,
                                           Response<ResponseBody> response) {
                        Log.v(LOG_TAG, "success");
                    }

                    @Override
                    public void onFailure(Call<ResponseBody> call, Throwable t) {
                        Log.e(LOG_TAG, t.getMessage());
                    }
                });
            } catch (Exception e) {
                Log.d(LOG_TAG, "file failed");
            }
        }

I am unable to get the paths correct to be able to upload the file to my server.

08-10 01:28:36.564 20093-20093/com.sudhirkhanger.app.test D/TestActivityFragment: fileUri content://com.android.providers.media.documents/document/image%3A57373
08-10 01:28:36.564 20093-20093/com.sudhirkhanger.app.test D/TestActivityFragment: file /document/image:57373
08-10 01:28:36.658 20093-20093/com.sudhirkhanger.app.test E/TestActivityFragment: /document/image:57373: open failed: ENOENT (No such file or directory) 

Answer 1

ACTION_GET_CONTENT does not return a file. It returns a Uri that points to a piece of content. That content does not have to be a file, let alone one that you can access. File file = new File(fileUri.getPath()); is useless.

I have not used OkHttp3/Retrofit's RequestBody. From what I can see, you would need to create your own implementation that can work off of an InputStream. You would get that InputStream by calling openInputStream() on a ContentResolver, which you get by calling getContentResolver() on a Context.