PWAs as URL Handlers

[LuHuangMSFT]

Saluton TAG!

I'm requesting a TAG review of Progressive Web Apps as URL Handlers.

"Native applications on many operating systems (Windows, Android, iOS, MacOS) can be associated with http(s) URLs. They can request to be launched as URL handlers when associated URLs are activated. For example, a user could click on a link to a news story from an e-mail. An associated native app for viewing news stories would automatically be launched to handle the activation of the link. Web developers would be able to build more compelling PWA experiences with stronger user engagement if PWAs could request to be URL handlers through their web app manifests."

• Explainer¹ https://github.com/WICG/pwa-url-handler/blob/master/explainer.md
• Security and Privacy self-review²: https://github.com/WICG/pwa-url-handler/blob/master/PRIVACY_AND_SECURITY.md
• GitHub repo (if you prefer feedback filed there): https://github.com/WICG/pwa-url-handler
• Primary contacts (and their relationship to the specification):
  • Lu Huang (luhuangMSFT), Microsoft
• Organization/project driving the design: Microsoft
• External status/issue trackers for this feature (publicly visible, e.g. Chrome Status): https://www.chromestatus.com/feature/5739732661174272

Further details:

• I have reviewed the TAG's API Design Principles
• The group where the incubation/design work on this is being done (or is intended to be done in the future): WICG
• The group where standardization of this work is intended to be done ("unknown" if not known): Web Applications Working Group
• Existing major pieces of multi-stakeholder review or discussion of this design: Github issues
• Major unresolved issues with or opposition to this design: compatibility with Declarative Link Capturing proposal
• This work is being funded by: Microsoft

You should also know that...

We'd prefer the TAG provide feedback as (please delete all but the desired option):
🐛 open issues in our GitHub repo for each point of feedback

[kenchris]

@marcoscaceres @anssiko you probably want to have a look at this

[kenchris]

I got a bit confused by

            "exclude_paths": [
                "/only/for/partnerapp/*"
            ]

Does this mean that the partnerapp (in this case) cannot be developed as a PWA?

[LuHuangMSFT]

@kenchris Thanks for asking. That exclude pattern says that the app at https://contoso.com/manifest.json has permission to capture all paths except for paths matching "/only/for/partnerapp/", i.e. https://tenant.contoso.com/only/for/partnerapp/. There is no special significance to that particular path pattern. I just wanted to illustrate that the origin may want to allocate URLs to be handled by different apps.

There's no reason why https://tenant.contoso.com/only/for/partnerapp/ cannot itself be the scope of a PWA (although the origin would then probably not want to allow other apps to handle those URLs). There is also no reason why the PWA at https://partnerapp.com/manifest.json would be hampered.

[LuHuangMSFT]

Quick fyi for visibility: I just merged a small PR to the explainer which mainly adjusted the manifest and association file JSON format for this feature.
WICG/pwa-url-handler#17

[kenchris]

I think it makes sense to use the pattern from https://github.com/WICG/urlpattern/blob/master/explainer.md for this @wanderview

At least for allowed urls or disallowed urls

[wanderview]

FWIW I suggested that in WICG/pwa-url-handler#21.

[kenchris]

"There is one use case that we wish to address in this explainer: URL activation in native applications."

I think this should also work for installed web applications such as Progressive Web Apps if the URL is out of scope

[ylafon]

Also, the goals seems to be matching what the MiniApp WG wants to define, I suggest discussing with them as well (ping @xfq)

[LuHuangMSFT]

I think it makes sense to use the pattern from https://github.com/WICG/urlpattern/blob/master/explainer.md for this

I'll open a PR asap to edit the explainer so we can see what it looks like using URLPattern.

I think this should also work for installed web applications such as Progressive Web Apps if the URL is out of scope

I think url_handlers and web-app-origin-association is able to support this. However, I think this behavior falls under navigation capture and would like to see the in-scope version of it enabled with Declarative Link Capturing first.

Also, the goals seems to be matching what the MiniApp WG wants to define, I suggest discussing with them as well

Thanks for the connect. I'll review the group charter and docs.

[kenchris]

Hi there, how does this relate to https://github.com/WICG/manifest-incubations/blob/gh-pages/scope_extensions-explainer.md

That document says:

The Scope Extensions proposal is intended to be a replacement for the URL Handlers proposal with the following changes:

We assume that this means that this proposal is now not moving forward?

[atanassov]

We took another look this during our Gethen vf2f plenary. At this point we are closing this review since it has been already overtaken by the new work on scope extensions. Thank you for working with us. We look forward to reviewing the new proposal.