Launch another windows store app - windows-8

Question

Is it possible to launch a different windows store app when a user clicks on a button within my app?

Answer 1

Yes, you can launch other Windows Store Apps from your app like say Bing Maps. The Maps app supports protocol activation, which means you can programmatically invoke the Maps app from your own Windows Store app, using a special url syntax.
Windows allows an app to register to become the default handler for a certain URI scheme name. Both desktop and Windows Store apps can register to be a default handler for a URI scheme name. You can see http://devhammer.net/blog/w8wil-6-leverage-the-maps-app-for-location-based-features to get the idea.
The official docs for the Maps app uri scheme, including all of the available parameters, can be found at: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/apps/jj635237.aspx

Answer 2

Sadly, it is not possible as Win-RT apps are not allowed to launch other apps.
There's a workaround that allows you to open a specific app if it's registered to open with a specific URL:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsphone/develop/jj206987(v=vs.105).aspx
I'm not sure if it will help much, but you can open the store and go to a specific store app page with:
Launcher.LaunchUriAsync(new Uri("ms-windows-store:PDP?PFN=" + storeID), a);
Where the storeID looks like '30416[AppName].[AppName]_94hq21bnosq1p' and can be obtained from the web store source code:
http://apps.microsoft.com/webpdp/en-gb/app/Fhotoroom/4d91298a-07cb-40fb-aecc-4cb5615d53c1

Answer 3

Yes, it is possible to launch any existing windows store app from your app all you need to do is navigate to http://www.windowsphone.com/url-of-existing-app.
this will first open app in browser than automatically it will open in store itself.
write the following code in button click event
private void AnotherApp(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
WebBrowserTask task = new WebBrowserTask();
task.URL = "http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/all-base-to-all-base-converter/869cea08-3a99-4218-8d4f-a631c2fb8f53";
task.Show();
}
app will first open app in browser than automatically the control will be forwarded to it store.