[android] How to Upload Image file in Retrofit 2

For those with an inputStream, you can upload inputStream using Multipart.

@Multipart
@POST("pictures")
suspend fun uploadPicture(
        @Part part: MultipartBody.Part
): NetworkPicture

Then in perhaps your repository class:

suspend fun upload(inputStream: InputStream) {
   val part = MultipartBody.Part.createFormData(
         "pic", "myPic", RequestBody.create(
              MediaType.parse("image/*"),
              inputStream.readBytes()
          )
   )
   uploadPicture(part)
}

To get an input stream you can do something like so.

In your fragment or activity, you need to create an image picker that returns an InputStream. The advantage of an InputStream is that it can be used for files on the cloud like google drive and dropbox.

Call pickImage() from a View.OnClickListener or onOptionsItemSelected.

    private fun pickImage() {
        val intent = Intent(Intent.ACTION_GET_CONTENT)
        intent.type = "image/*"
        startActivityForResult(intent, PICK_PHOTO)
    }

    override fun onActivityResult(requestCode: Int, resultCode: Int, data: Intent?) {
        super.onActivityResult(requestCode, resultCode, data)
        if (requestCode == PICK_PHOTO && resultCode == Activity.RESULT_OK) {
            try {
                data?.let {
                    val inputStream: InputStream? =
                        context?.contentResolver?.openInputStream(it.data!!)
                    inputStream?.let { stream ->
                        itemViewModel.uploadPicture(stream)
                    }
                }
            } catch (e: FileNotFoundException) {
                e.printStackTrace()
            }
        }
    }

    companion object {
        const val PICK_PHOTO = 1
    }