Apple's documentation about the new iOS smart banners feature in mobile Safari talks about how to implement application:openURL:sourceApplication:annotation to allow your app to be opened from the banner, taking the user directly to a specific area of your app:
Promoting Apps with Smart App Banners
My question is, how does one test/debug this functionality? I.e. how can you trigger a call to application:openURL:sourceApplication:annotation passing in a test URL of your choice?
If you are using a custom url scheme like walmart://whatever/whatever you can type it into safari and it'll hit application:openURL:sourceApplication:annotation
Related
I am working on project where I have been implementing deep linking from app/browser to my app. I have everything setup and it has been working as expected.
But recently, there is changed to the other app where there is new url introduced, which is launching in the browser and that url has changed to exiting url. But it is not launching my app. How to implement and launch my app with that change?
Example
--> deep link url, https://www.externalApp.com/requestPage=homePage&id=4444
--> When user tap on button on the external app, the above URL is invoke and launch the my app.
After change
--> Now new url, http://www.externalApp.com/request=sometoken
--> when user tap on button, http://www.externalApp.com/request=sometoken invoke and open browser and then become https://www.externalApp.com/requestPage=homePage&id=4444 in the browser. But it is staying in the browser and not opening my app.
Expectation is to launch app after url become https://www.externalApp.com/requestPage=homePage&id=4444.
Please help and advise.
A URL redirect will not trigger your app deeplink under any circumstance.
The ideal way to do this would be for your app to handle the URL http://www.externalApp.com/request=sometoken and convert it into https://www.externalApp.com/requestPage=homePage&id=4444 using whatever logic you are currently executing server-side (or on the webpage).
If this is not possible in any way, then the discussion goes into the direction of ugly hacks where you try to trigger the deeplink using Javscript, which can fail (since you cannot guarantee that the deeplinked app is present on the device). I would not delve into those pathways here and recommend you re-think your solution.
Please note that I do not mean to disparage or deride your implementation in any way. You may have a valid use-case where such a flow is required. But with how universal links work on iOS, the above is my recommendation based on my experience as a developer.
I've added app links headers for my web site with metadata for my iOS app, but they don't open app when post is clicked. Is app links works as described in documentation in 2017? (https://developers.facebook.com/docs/applinks/add-to-content)
This is expected behavior
Unfortunately it is not currently possible to directly launch a third-party app from within the iOS Facebook app. This is a known issue that Facebook has essentially written off as wontfix. This is still possible in the Android Facebook app, but it's unfortunate they haven't been more transparent about the change to the iOS version because there is quite a bit of confusion about it.
Instagram is a special case because it is a Facebook-owned app and gets different treatment.
But you can work around it
Services like Branch.io (full disclosure: I am on the team) get around this by implementing a judicious combination of App Links, URI schemes, and iOS Universal Links. Essentially what you need to do is open a page in the webview and then have a button or other user-driven CTA event that launches the app from there. It's an extra step for the user, but currently the best workaround. If you just want to be able to post a link that goes into your app when it is installed and otherwise goes to a webpage (or the App/Play Store), then Branch links are definitely your simplest solution.
Branch link routing logic
I am trying to implement Branch marketing links in my app. I want for example to be able to create a link to share with users that will route them to a particular screen in the app. I noticed from the Branch docs that for some apps the link just opens the app store and not the actual app (even if it is installed). Being based in Asia I have the feeling that most of our customers will be wanting to share the link via an unsupported app such as Line. If a user is redirected to the app store via the link and then taps “open app”, what happens? Is the link meta data lost? Does the meta data only remain if the link is opened in an app such as mail or notes?
Alex from Branch.io here:
This list in the Branch documentation gives a partial list of apps that support Universal Links, but unfortunately it is not complete. We've tried to cover the most common apps.
Line is using a custom webview (not SFSafariViewController). It doesn't support Universal Links for the initial click, but this is one of the edge cases where Branch can detect the originating app and do some custom behavior. For Line, we trigger your app's URI scheme. This means the behavior your users see when clicking a Branch link from within Line is the same as Universal Links, even though Universal Links isn't actually the protocol being used.
If you want to handle other apps where Branch doesn't have a workaround like this, you could try enabling the deepviews feature. This will cause the link to open a content preview with a button to launch the app (or forward to the App Store if not installed).
When a user with the app already installed clicks the Open button on the App Store page, all the meta data is preserved and they will still be deep linked. Branch doesn't know (or care!) what happens between when the user clicks the link and the app launches, so that gives you plenty of flexibility.
Universal Links have some restrictions - not from Branch but from Apple's implementation. One of these restrictions is Universal Links cannot be opened from SFSafariViewController.
From Branch's docs, Line is not explicitly mentioned but other popular messaging apps may be of interest. I don't have Line myself but whether Line launches websites in it's own browser or the Safari app may give you a clue.
Facebook Messenger - works conditionally
WeChat - works conditionally
Twitter - works conditionally
LinkedIn - works conditionally
Any app using SFSafariViewController - works conditionally
We use an LMS calles Canvas by instructure. Our students access the LMS via the iOS app, however we would like to be able to call out from this app to another app (e-book reader).
We just want to be able to select a link which will redirect us to the app.
We have a coder in our staff, and we would really appreciate any advise on how to achieve the above.
You can communicate with URL Schemes between apps Apple Inter-App Communication
And here is Tutorial explaining URL Schemes implementation.
If you have access to the e-book reader app's codebase, this is simple to achieve by specifying a URL Scheme this app may respond to (or, alternatively, if you happen to know what URL Schemes this app supports). Then it will be as simple as calling out a URL of a corresponding format from within the iOS app your students use.
Alternatively, if your app provides access to the documents of some sort, you could look into UIDocumentInteractionController that can add "Open in..." functionality to your app, allowing app users to open a document in an arbitrary app that supports this file format.
Universal Links in iOS9 use the Handoff mechanism to look at a link in an app instead of the browser: Whenever a Universal Link is clicked, iOS activates the corresponding app and calls -application:continueUserActivity:restorationHandler with a user activity containing the Universal Link's URL (see Apple guide on Universal Links).
I'd like to trigger this mechanism manually, i.e. creating an NSUserActivity instance with a webpageURL property and dispatching it to be handled by the current app's -application:continueUserActivity:restorationHandler. Is there a way to achieve this?
At the moment I'm just calling -application:continueUserActivity:restorationHandler directly, but this feels wrong and I'd like to implement it in a more proper way.