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.
Related
Often when viewing a website on a mobile device you'll get a notification that a mobile app is available, or if you already have the app downloaded you'll have the option to open the URL in the app.
Is there a native way to do this or are these notifications always custom?
When users click on a link or download a file and the suggestion pops up to open the respective app, that's called deep linking. iOS labels it as Universal Links and Android uses App Links.
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).
Update: It appears Twitter has fixed this issue. Clicking the authorize button now works! Thank you all for the responses.
I have a UIWebView that opens and directs to Twitters Oauth/Authorize webpage. The user signs in with there Twitter details and authenticates the use of our application with there Twitter account. This process worked perfect before the release of Twitter 6.37 iOS application. What happens now is when the WebView detects https://twitter.com/oauth/authorize?oauth_token instead of staying in the WebView it opens the native Twitter application and dies. If you uninstall the Twitter application everything works as usually it staying within the WebView. How can I prevent this from happening? I want to stay within my UIWebView and not automatically open deep links. I have been reading about the new URL deep link changes in iOS 9, but not sure of how to stop them from my application to other native applications. Thanks for any help!
As a workaround, in twitter authentication screen we can use the Go button on iOS typing keypad instead of using the sign in button on web view until twitter fixes.
Please refer the attached screenshot link for clarity.
Screenshot for the workaround
I ran into this issue as well and figured out it was because my authorize endpoint was set to https://twitter.com/oauth/authorize?oauth_token="+oauthToken (I believe this was in the original documentation). If you add api as the subdomain: https://api.twitter.com/oauth/authorize?oauth_token="+oauthToken, it will no longer trigger the deep linking and load the twitter app.
My answer to this via a Xamarin question:
Unless Twitter removes/updates the apps section of "https://www.twitter.com/apple-app-site-association" to allow a bypass or a secondary oauth that is not in the apple-app-site-association file I do not see how you would do it. These files are signed and iOS handles them at an OS level.
I have not played around very much with the continueUserActivity delegate and the NSUserActivity object that is passed to apps launched from UNI links, but I do not see a way for the launched app (i.e. Twitter) to return control to the original app, and at that point the oauth call-chain would be broken anyway....
Unique. Unlike custom URL schemes, universal links can’t be claimed by other apps, because they use standard HTTP or HTTPS links to your website.
Secure. When users install your app, iOS checks a file that you’ve uploaded to your web server to make sure that your website allows your app to open URLs on its behalf. Only you can create and upload this file, so the association of your website with your app is secure.
Via: https://developer.apple.com/library/prerelease/ios/documentation/General/Conceptual/AppSearch/UniversalLinks.html
I would report as an issue (bug?) to Twitter's Dev forum: https://twittercommunity.com
How to launch a specific page of hybrid worklight application on clicking a link in email?
I did not go through all the steps involved, but yes, you can do this.
Step 1
Create a Worklight application using, for example, jQuery Mobile to handle the multiple pages
Step 2
If the app is intended for Android, you will need to modify the AndroidManifest.xml file with an intent filter in order to associate the app with an action and a custom URL scheme
You can read more about this by googling for "opening android application using a custom URL scheme", for example
If the app is intended for iOS, you will need to modify the <app-name->info.plist file with a custom URL scheme
You can probably follow this guide: http://iosdevelopertips.com/cocoa/launching-your-own-application-via-a-custom-url-scheme.html
Step 3
Once you get the app to open from an external link, you need to handle the parameters. You'll want this since you want to open a specific page. This is also mentioned for iOS in the above link, and you'll need to further google this for Android
Step 4
Once you've obtained the parameter, you can use the Send Action to JavaScript from Native API for iOS and Andriod in Worklight in order to pass a command to JavaScript, telling the web code to do some changePage function that will load the specific page
I have a mobile website built using jQuery Mobile. I am currently designing an iOS native app with a single webView to display this mobile website.
PROBLEM:
If the jQuery mobile webpage is viewed in a normal mobile browser, I want all to function normally. BUT if the webpage is viewed using the webView in the iPhone app (not Safari.app) I am designing, I want to include an additional line of code on the webpage to pull in some custom JS.
Here's what I want to be added to the page ONLY IF viewed inside of my iPhone app's webView:
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.example.com/mobile/js/custom-jqm-defaults.js"></script>
This code needs to be pulled in (according to the jQuery mobile docs) before jQuery Mobile is loaded. Is this possible? And if so, could you point me in the right direction and give me some code?
EDIT
I found this link whereby Facebook detects if they are being viewed WITHIN an app. Is there another way to do this obviously NOT using the FB API? Here is their code:
if (FB.UA.nativeApp()) {
// Hide your credits stuff
}
You can change the user agent in your NSURLRequest, and then check for that agent on your server.
Changing it app-side is easy.