I am developing an iOS safari extension. Right after the installation and opening the container app, I would like to take the users to a page which shows instructions on how to enable the extension and allow it to run on all pages. Is there a way to detect the state of the extension?
So, the flow will be as: User opens the container app, and we take the user to a page on safari and depending on:
(1) if the extension is enabled
(2) if the extension is allowed to run on all pages
How can I detect these two states from the extension ?
Tried looking around if there is an API to detect so. Doesn't seem there to be one?
Related
Even though the Application is installed in the iPhone, tapping Branchio universal deep-link redirecting to safari and shows a popup to launch the application.
Expected: if the application is already installed, tapping deep link should launch the application.
Pre- requests:
OS: iPhone iOS 13.3.1
Release build in Appcenter
Set custom URL to https://install.appcenter.ms/app (Appcenter)
Generate the Universal deeplink
Steps to reproduce:
Generate the Universal deep-link
Using the deep-link install the application
Again Tap on the same deep-link will redirect to Safari and popup alert with CANCEL and OPEN options
Tap OPEN in safari to launch the application
This is an expected behaviour where Apple prompts the user first time if to open the app. Only if universal links are implemented, it does not ask for the second time. Our AASA validator tool (https://branch.io/resources/aasa-validator/) shows the AASA file to validated correctly but while testing on the install page of your redirected website, it is showing a 404 error. So, we are unable to replicate this on our end to check further.
Could you please share your app store link so as to help us out here.
Also, would request to check our documentation here ( https://help.branch.io/developers-hub/docs/ios-troubleshooting#section-validate-if-aasa-file-successfully-downloaded ) so as to confirm if the device is receiving the generated AASA files. This is a known issue with Apple for iOS 13.x+ where the AASA files do not get ingested into the device and causes the link redirection to show a prompt or a fail.
I need to open a third-party app from my react native mobile app. I understand that this is called universal linking on iOS and AppLink on Android.
I have done a lot of research for this, and I have been able to set up a link to the third party app on the app store. Now I just need to get my app to open up the app if the user has it installed. That requires the URI scheme of the other app, though.
My question is, how do I get the URI scheme to this third party app? Rather, how do I get the URI scheme of any app? I know the URI scheme of the twitter app is 'twitter://app', but the app I am trying to link to is way more niche than twitter or other popular apps, so there is no help for this sort of thing online.
Any tips?
Finding the URL scheme of an iOS app
Due to Apple's tendency for secrecy, it's not easy to find the URL scheme of an iOS app. But it can be done. Here's how I do it, using a Mac app called iMazing.
Launch iMazing, select a connected iOS device, click Apps:
In the footer of the window, click Manage Apps:
Select the app you're interested in , then select Export .IPA menu item. Note: You may need to download the app first.
The saved file will have the .ipa extension. Change the extension to .zip, and unzip the file. You now have a directory with the name matching the app's name.
Assuming "asana" is the app name, open the file "asana/Payload/asana.app/Info.plist" in a text editor, and search for a section that contains "CFBundleURLSchemes". Assuming the app contains CFBundleURLSchemes (they are optional), it should look something like this:
The URL scheme is in the <string>asana</string>, so the complete url scheme in this case is "asana://". Test that the URL launches the app by typing it into iOS Safari browser window. If it works, Safari should display an alert like this:
What About Apps Without CFBundleURLSchemes?
I haven't found a way to launch apps without CFBundleURLSchemes directly, but you can link to the app's page in the App Store, where the user can open the app with the Open button (or Get button if the app is not installed).
You will need to obtain the app page's URL from the App Store:
Open App Store, go to the app's page, click the share icon:
Click Copy Link:
The URL will look like this:
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/asana-organize-tasks-work/id489969512
Clicking on that link in Safari will bring up the app page in the App Store.
Maybe it is worth to start with some background:
There are various ways to deep link into an app, and it depends on the platform (iOS\Android\WindowsPhone...) and its version.
On iOS, up until version 9, the way to open an app was by using URI schemes, e.g. the one you added above: twitter://app. Each app declares the scheme that should be used. Therefore in order to deep link into the app you wish to open, you'll need to use the scheme that it declared. This is the same for Android until version 6.
Starting iOS9+, Apple introduced Universal Links as the method for deep linking. Here's some information: https://developer.apple.com/ios/universal-links/
In these versions, URI schemes won't longer work when using Safari browser (which is the iOS default browser) if the app is not installed. If the app is installed, however, URI schemes should allow opening the app, if everything is configured successfully. In Android there's a similar method called "AppLinks".
Having said this, the above information is for setting deep link for your app. I do not think that it is a common use case to open a third party app from your app - deep links are configured and used by the app owner (e.g. for publishing his\her app to engage users).
I want to host an extension on my own website
When user clicks a specific button on my site, extension should install automatically just like it does from Apple - Safari - Extension section https://extensions.apple.com
You cannot do that. Inline installation of extensions from 3rd party websites is not available on Safari.
You can however just download the extension yourself and open it programmatically.
Or
You can ask the user to download the extension and double click the extension from the downloads folder. However if you take this route you will need to have some UI to educate the user.
I am making mobile app using Sencha touch which will be bundled as native app and installed on devices. In my app on certain pages I want to add "share" functionality which is supposed to post some data to user's feed. While testing on browser I can to do that by opening a window with FB sharing url like "https://m.facebook.com/dialog/feed" or "https://m.facebook.com/sharer.php" and passing all related params as explained in https://developers.facebook.com/docs/reference/dialogs/feed/
But when this app is bundled and I share with this, user is moved to browser and cannot return to app because redirect_uri cannot point to app which is why I wanted to open this dialog within my app, probably in an iFrame. This is also not possible because these dialogs are not allowed to be embedded in iframe by META tags and in order to surpass it I have to do user login which again is another dialog which I cannot open in my app's iFrame.
I also looked at sample sencha app http://blooming-day-7830.herokuapp.com/ but it also takes user to separate login page instead of opening in-app dialog.
So my questions is how does hybrid apps connect with FB without moving out user to browser?
if you decide to use PhoneGap you can try the following two options. You will have to check for the iOS version before you switch your Phonegap call to. . .
Option 1 : for iOS before 6.0
Phonegap has a pretty nifty ChildBrowser plugin that you can use to load the FB share page without leaving the app for iOS 5.0 and below.
Option 2 : for iOS 6.0+
Facebook Share functionality has now been added to iOS. So all you have to do, is call a custom plugin class that you create, and call the standard FB share code using a basic Phonegap plugin call. You won't leave the app, the ChildBrowser doesn't have to show up, instead, you'll get the stock iOS-FB share sheet that will show up, you can add pictures, text, and so on, and post to facebook.
I have created a custom App URL for my iOS app. The URL format is similar to this:
myappname://texttobeparsed
This works fine when I paste the URL in safari, My App opens and correctly handles the URL. The problem is that other apps such as iMessage or Notes do not recognize this as a URL.
Why isn't this URL scheme being recognized as a URL? Could it have to do with how I set it up in my info.plist file or something else?
Or, does the URL need to be in a different format to be recognized?
I know it's possible to have the system recognize it as a URL in apps other than web-browsers because I've seen it before with other apps (ex. iTunes: itms://itunes.com/apps/appname or Twitter: twitter:// or Facebook: fb://).
There's nothing you can do about this. If the link isn't explicit (e.g. in an HTML email), these apps can just recognize a built-in set of standard URL schemes. itms:// is one of Apple's own schemes (for the iTunes Store), so it makes sense that it is supported in addition to the standard mailto://, http://, tel://... schemes.
Edit: I would guess that the information that is used to determine what constitutes a valid URL in text views etc. is cached somehow. Contrary to what I initially guessed, it seems that app-specific URLs do work in Notes, etc. I've tested this with tweetbot:// for example (which I have installed) and twitter:// (which I don't have installed) to verify that it doesn't just check for a pattern like *://, but actually uses information about the installed apps.
I'd suggest that you try to restart your device. If it's an issue with some cache, that might help and I don't think there's much else you could do if your URL scheme already works in Safari.
Update: I've installed the official Twitter app to test this, the twitter:// scheme wasn't immediately recognized in Notes, but after killing and restarting the Notes app, it worked.
Update 2: I've done a minimal test app with myappname:// as a custom URL scheme. Again, like with the Twitter app, it worked after restarting the Notes app, so it doesn't seem related to the popularity of the app or whether it's been submitted or not.
I can't answer as to why it's not working (beyond guessing that the link interpreter is hard-coded to only recognize certain URL schemes), but I can say that the typical way around this is to link to a web page, and have the web page redirect to your custom scheme.
It's slightly less elegant, because the user will see Safari open up briefly before being forwarded to your app, but it's also more robust because the web page can provide a link to the app store to install the app if it is not installed on the user's phone.