Resources access through NDK C++ Android

To work with resources in Android through ndk – C ++ there are several options:

  1. Use access to the resources of the apk file using AssetManager
  2. Download resources from the Internet and extract them in the application directory, used by standard methods C ++
  3. Combined method – to get access to the archive with resources apk through AssetManager, unpack them in the application directory, then use with standard C ++ techniques

Next, I will describe the combination of access methods using the game engine Flame Steel Engine.
When using SDL can facilitate access to the resources of the apk, library wraps the calls to AssetManager, offering a similar interface to the stdio (fopen, fread, fclose, etc.)


SDL_RWops *io = SDL_RWFromFile("files.fschest", "r");

After the file download from the apk to the buffer, you need to change the current working directory to the application directory, it is available to the application without additional permits. For this we use a wrapper on SDL:

 
chdir(SDL_AndroidGetInternalStoragePath());

Next, write down the file from the clipboard to the current working directory using fopen, fwrite, fclose. After the archive will be available in the directory for C ++, unpack it. Archives zip can extract a combination of two libraries – minizip and zlib, the first structure can work with files, the second decompresses the data.
For more control, simplicity, portability, I realized own archive format with zero compression called FSChest (Flame Steel Chest). This format supports the directory archiving files, and unpacking; Support folder hierarchy is missing, can work only with files.
Connecting the library header FSChest, unpack the archive:

 
#include "fschest.h" 
FSCHEST_extractChestToDirectory(archivePath, SDL_AndroidGetInternalStoragePath());

After unpacking, C / C ++ interfaces will be available files from the archive. So I did not have to rewrite all the work with the files in the engine, and add only unpacking files at startup.

References

https://developer.android.com/ndk/reference/group/asset

Source Code

https://gitlab.com/demensdeum/space-jaguar-action-rpg
https://gitlab.com/demensdeum/fschest

Published by demensdeum