i am in the process of making my app with firebase i am pretty much done with that except Firebase App Indexing. I am very exited with this feature because it could help me to increase my app get more traffic from the web but the problem is i really can't able to see how to implement this. According to Firebase Docs i just need to register my app with this pice of code
[[FIRAppIndexing sharedInstance] registerApp:your Apple ID from iTunes Connect];
I have done that but what should i do after that?
1.My app is firebase app that means i don't have any website to host my content except firebase realtime database. Does my content is available for crawlers? if not how can i make available to them?
2.If i can able to show my content in the google search results i don't wanna show all the content and i wanna show just some of my content for example i have a social app for sharing General Knowledge questions, i wanna show just the question like "What is the highest mountain" in the search results and if the user want to see the answer it should take them to my app how can i do that?
3.As per docs i came to know that i need to create univiersal links for my app content to direct users from google search but how shold i do that ? Lets say should i crate universal links when the user create question?? if so how can i do that ??
Thank you very much for the help.
This is not currently possible on iOS using Firebase App Indexing. The situation is slightly different on Android, but that is not applicable to your question.
On iOS, Firebase App Indexing is simply highlighting pages on your website in Google search results that have corresponding content inside your app. This is achieved by piggybacking on Apple's Universal Links standard, and there is no proactive 'crawling' going on inside your app. This means unless you have a corresponding web page for your app with 1:1 content parity, you can't really benefit from Firebase App Indexing on iOS as it comes out-of-the-box.
The best workaround is to generate little 'placeholder pages' for every piece of content in your app, which the sole purpose of opening your app (if it is installed) or redirecting to the App Store (if it is not installed). Ideally you'll need some sort of deferred deep linking system so that users still see the correct content after downloading. Fun fact: this is essentially how HotelTonight operates their entire business model. Unfortunately Firebase's implementation is not mature enough to support this full flow, and Google hasn't quite figured out how to rank app-only content properly yet in search results so you will probably need to pro-actively submit your placeholder pages to them.
Shameless plug: at Branch, we provide all of the above as a free service. You can read more about it here and take a look at the set up docs here.
Related
I am trying to track down these URLs because I would like to integrate them with the Shortcuts (previously workflow) app. My end game is to make queries that will perform certain functions that I can call from a google home device. In simpler terms, I want to make google home more "Apple friendly."
I have not found anything that is too current out there on the URL schemes. I saw that sending a SMS message was triggered with sms://<PhoneNumber> , but I am not sure how up to date that information is.
I plan on adding features to search Apple Music (by triggering a workflow). I am also planning on adding text message features.
I am also looking into making an app for google home, but I still am in the learning stage with that. Any advice on making google home more Apple friendly would be greatly appreciated.
This is a constantly changing list given the number of features being added or third-party apps. Here's a list that does a good job of staying up-to-date: https://ios.gadgethacks.com/news/always-updated-list-ios-app-url-scheme-names-0184033/
Is it possible to read the contents of another application installed on an iPhone? What about from an extension or keyboard?
I'm trying to come up with something that 'checks' other apps to see if they have any deep links (like Twitter's Twitter://timeline that takes users straight to the timeline in the Twitter app).
Is there any smart way to check a given app for deep links?
Is it even possible to peek at another app's contents from within my app? I suspect no.
If no, what about making a keyboard or extension of some sort that I can access from an app like Twitter and see its contents, such as a URL deep link?
You don't have much options, you may use -canOpenURL:, but, since iOS9, must include special credentails listing all the custom schemes you want to check.
You can't read other app's contents on a non-rooted device unless this app is sharing a keychain (so it can exchange data via the shared keychain). The same thing goes with extensions.
iOS has some high bars on security, so, don't expect much or even, anything.
Something you may want is IntentKit. Also there are ideas around the web about standard url query format like MobileDeepLinking.
I'm new to mobile programming. Recently my company has looked into creating a specific application for tablets (Android and iOS). So it was assigned to me to develop a thin-client based around using HTML5 for what we need to do.
Essentially the application allows a user to fill in a custom-designed form (which the user can build themselves, or pull down a predefined template from our server). This form is built using HTML5, Javascript, JQuery, etc. Some additional functionality is planned, such as being able to take a picture using the native device and attach it to the form that we send back to our server for storage (once we figure out how to do it in iOS. We've already done it in Android.)
However, I noticed the following on Apple's App Store Guidelines, under the Functionality section. Item 2.12:
Apps that are not very useful, unique, are simply web sites bundled as Apps, or do not provide any lasting entertainment value may be rejected
Can someone explain, or at least direct me to clarification of this when using the UIWebView construct? This application at its core is pretty much just HTML5. While it might have some additional bells and whistles, does this mean that if we try to submit this (when its completed) to Apple, that they will simply reject it out of hand? Implementing the majority of it in HTML5 was done purposely so we wouldn't have to re-code everything from device to device (and we will also embed it in one of our products, so if they want to fill it out on the desktop while in our system, they can.)
Any guidance would be appreciated, or even suggestions of where this question should be asked if SO is not the proper forum for it. Thanks again.
The key in the Appstore guideline is the word "simply":
Apps that are not very useful, unique, are simply web sites bundled as
Apps
If you keep a balance between locally stored and remote HTML content for your webviews Apple would not look at the app as a hollow shell pulling in remote content.
I am building some services that will scrape data from a number of websites and be stored into a database. I am then using services to call this data into an iOS app and display it in an organized manner that will be useful to users. Will my app be rejected due to this policy?
12.3
Apps that are simply web clippings, content aggregators, or a
collection of links, may be rejected
I am not using any child browser, etc. When a user views the data within the app they may click a link to go to the specific webpage in Safari separately, but there is no "Buy" button, etc.
As long as you're adding some value to the content I don't think you have a problem. Look at Flipbook; it basically rehashes people's web data, but it a useful way. Aggregation itself isn't bad, it's people who don't put an effort to curate or correlate the data is where I believe Apple has a problem.
tl;dr: It depends on how you implement your app.
I would like to search the Apple App Store from within my app, and return App information such as Icon, Description, Name, etc.
I found some examples using URL's. But from what I understand, they cause your app to pause as it opens either the App Store or the browser. If I am mistaken, please may you provide me with an example on how to accomplish this (seemingly) simple task?
Regards,
Shane
I don't think there is an API available to do what you are describing directly in the iOS device. However, you could hack something together using the search API available from apple. Check it out at here. You could do this behind the scenes rather then using the browser. It's not a simple task, but it is doable. Besk of luck.