ADDING NTFS SUPPORT TO ANDROID OPERATING SYSTEM VIA KERNEL

Android is a nascent mobile operating system based on the Linux kernel that is developed by Google but lacks support for disks partitioned with the NTFS. Currently in the Google Play Store there are some third party applications to provide NTFS support to Android OS. But the main disadvantage of such applications is that the phone needs to be rooted (flashed) which may be tedious for a lay user and in many cases may void the device’s warranty. And above all, a custom ROM needs to be installed to avail the NTFS functionality. This paper covers a technique to provide native support for NTFS (New Technology File System) in the Android operating system by avoiding the rooting process. Hence to use NTFS-SD card or NTFS HDD we won’t require any third party applications to perform basic read/write operations. This is implemented with the help of the Virtual Filesystem layer (VFS) which is a subsystem of the kernel that implements the file and the file system-related interfaces provided to user-space programs. The NTFS will rely on the VFS layer to enable programs to use standard UNIX system calls to make basic operations like read/write as well as advanced features which NTFS has.