This post discusses the problem of content silos on the web, particularly how native apps dominate sharing functionalities, limiting the web's reach. It highlights the irony of navigator.share, which, while enabling web sharing, still directs users towards native apps. The post emphasizes the need for the web to participate more actively in user interactions. It celebrates the 'Improved add to home-screen' feature for PWAs on Android, generating APKs and making them function more like native apps. Finally, it introduces the promising 'Share Target API', allowing PWAs to receive shared content, including links, thus breaking down silos and fostering a more inclusive web ecosystem.
This post explores how to use Android Intents to detect if a native app is installed. This technique is useful for web apps that also have a native app version, especially for managing push notifications. It allows developers to seamlessly redirect users to the app if it's installed or fall back to the web experience. The method involves creating a special intent URL that opens the app if present, or redirects to a specific URL with a hash fragment. By monitoring the hash change in the browser, the web app can detect if the app launch failed and proceed with web-based push notification registration. While helpful, this approach highlights the complexity of managing push notifications across web and native apps, reinforcing the argument for web-only solutions.
I'm still passionate about making web apps easily discoverable and interlinked, even though Web Intents didn't take off as I'd hoped. We web developers boast about the power of the URL, but we're not leveraging it effectively for inter-app linking, which is hindering the web's potential. Recent experiences building a QR code reader and seeing how other apps integrate them highlighted this issue. The web's strength is its zero-install nature, allowing instant access to functionality. However, many web apps erect barriers like landing pages and login forms, negating this advantage. These barriers act like app store install pages, killing the linkability and ease of use that makes the web great. While capturing user data is important, we need to prioritize frictionless usage, perhaps by adopting concepts like "tourist" or "shadow" user accounts. Native apps are exploring app constellations, while we on the web already have the tools but aren't utilizing them effectively. We must allow users instant access if we want truly linkable web apps.
I had a great time speaking at the Berlin GTUG, despite the unexpectedly hot weather. I presented on Web Apps, highlighting the differences between native and web apps, key principles of good app design, and some of the exciting new possibilities with HTML5, CSS3, and WebSockets. I wish I'd had more time to delve into frameworks for building great apps and do some live coding. Chris Chabot also gave a fantastic talk about Buzz. The venue, BetaHaus, was excellent, and I was impressed by everyone's English fluency. Thanks to all who attended!
