PDF not loading from documents folder on App relaunch iOS - ios

Question

I have a pdf that I download from the server and save it. Next I open the file from the file path within a UIWebView. This works the first time I launch the app. When I relaunch the app again, even thought the file path is the same, the document does not open. Also, the document does exist in the document folder of the app.
I am doing something like :-
SaveToFolder.cs
var filePath = Path.Combine(Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Personal), fileName);
using (FileStream destinationStream = File.Create(filePath))
{
await documentStream.CopyToAsync(destinationStream);
}
File path after saving the document first time :-
/var/mobile/Containers/Data/Application/C3EA2325-81CA-4EC9-8C03-479ACF7EE330/Documents/Insufficiency.pdf
File Path on app relaunch
/var/mobile/Containers/Data/Application/C3EA2325-81CA-4EC9-8C03-479ACF7EE330/Documents/Insufficiency.pdf
Is there something Iam doing wrong?

Answer 1

I have created a file in iOS for reading & writing file. Please have a look in iOS
using System;
using Xamarin.Forms;
using FileReader.iOS;
using System.IO;
using FileReader;
using Foundation;
using System.Linq;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
[assembly: Dependency(typeof(SaveAndLoadiOS))]
namespace FileReader.iOS
{
public class SaveAndLoadiOS : LoadAndSave
{
public static string DocumentPath
{
get
{
var documentURL = NSFileManager.DefaultManager.GetUrls(NSSearchPathDirectory.DocumentDirectory, NSSearchPathDomain.User).Last();
return documentURL.Path;
}
}
public string CreatePath(string fileName)
{
return Path.Combine(DocumentPath, fileName);
}
public async Task SaveTextAsync(string fileName, string text)
{
string path = CreatePath(fileName);
if (IsFileExits(fileName))
{
File.Delete(path);
}
using (StreamWriter sw = File.CreateText(path))
await sw.WriteAsync(text);
}
public async Task<string> LaodTextAsync(string fileName)
{
string path = CreatePath(fileName);
using (StreamReader sr = File.OpenText(path))
return await sr.ReadToEndAsync();
}
public bool IsFileExits(string fileName)
{
return File.Exists (CreatePath(fileName));
}
}
}
For reading from my .CS class (subclass of ContentPage), Below is the code
var tempFileService = DependencyService.Get<LoadAndSave>();
var itemFile = await tempFileService.LaodTextAsync(tempFile.StoredFileName);
var rootobject = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<Rootobject>(itemFile);
Where LoadAndSave is an interface as below
using System;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
namespace FileReader
{
public interface LoadAndSave
{
Task SaveTextAsync(string fileName, string text);
Task<string> LaodTextAsync(string fileName);
bool IsFileExits(string fileName);
}
}
Hope it helps.

Answer 2

I ran into the same issue a while ago. You can refer Can't find saved file (in device) after restarting the app
According to the answer
You shouldn't store raw file paths for persistence (or if you do, know that the root can move on you). A better practice would be to only store the relative part of the path and always attach it to the current "root" path in question (particularly if you might be sharing data across devices as with iCloud).
Maybe your root is changing as well. You can change your approach and append the filename with the default path to your documents folder like so in Xamarin:-
var docsPath = Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.MyDocuments);
filePath = docsPath +"/" + "Insuffeciency.pdf";
Also, consider changing your Personal folder to MyDocuments folder while saving the file.