Question

I have got an image path that I want to store in the shared preferences.

1. How do I store the path inside the shared preferences?
2. How can I retrieve the image path from the shared preferences?

Answer 1

All you have to do is, convert your image to it’s Base64 string representation:

Bitmap realImage = BitmapFactory.decodeStream(stream);
ByteArrayOutputStream baos = new ByteArrayOutputStream();
realImage.compress(Bitmap.CompressFormat.JPEG, 100, baos);   
byte[] b = baos.toByteArray(); 

String encodedImage = Base64.encodeToString(b, Base64.DEFAULT);
textEncode.setText(encodedImage);

SharedPreferences shre = PreferenceManager.getDefaultSharedPreferences(this);
Editor edit=shre.edit();
edit.putString("image_data",encodedImage);
edit.commit();

and then, when retrieving, convert it back into bitmap:

SharedPreferences shre = PreferenceManager.getDefaultSharedPreferences(this);
String previouslyEncodedImage = shre.getString("image_data", "");

if( !previouslyEncodedImage.equalsIgnoreCase("") ){
    byte[] b = Base64.decode(previouslyEncodedImage, Base64.DEFAULT);
    Bitmap bitmap = BitmapFactory.decodeByteArray(b, 0, b.length);
    imageConvertResult.setImageBitmap(bitmap);
}

However, I have to tell you that Base64 support is only recently included in API8. To target on lower API version, you need to add it first. Luckily, this guy already have the needed tutorial.

Also i have to tell you that this is a complex procedure and shareprefrence use only to store small amount of data such as user name and password that’s way you can also use such a method:

store image path (from sdcard) into Share preferences like this–

SharedPreferences shre = PreferenceManager.getDefaultSharedPreferences(this);
Editor edit=shre.edit();
edit.putString("imagepath","/sdcard/imh.jpeg");
edit.commit();

To load your image path you can use this

final SharedPreferences sharedPreference = getSharedPreferences(
                "pref_key", MODE_PRIVATE);
        if (sharedPreference.contains("imagepath")) {
            String mFilePath = sharedPreference.getString(imagepath,
                    null);
        }

After getting you path you can use:

File imgFile = new  File(mFilePath);
if(imgFile.exists()){

    Bitmap myBitmap = BitmapFactory.decodeFile(imgFile.getAbsolutePath());

    ImageView myImage = (ImageView) findViewById(R.id.imageviewTest);
    myImage.setImageBitmap(myBitmap);

}