First, I have a web app made with angular + angular material that looks like a mobile app, now I "ported" this webapp to a native mobile app using capacitor + cordova plugins and works fine, all the features work fine.
My deployment proces is:
Build angular app, sync to android, build android and then publish in play store (same for ios), it works, but, every time I make a change to my web app, I have to repeat this process and you know, the user has to download the new version of the app, install, and use, I would like to avoid this.
Since my app is web, located on a site (It can be accesses via web too) I would like to know if there is something that inside my webview opens the url of my site (without exiting the app, I tried making a redirection but it opens a web browser), so, the end user won't have to download the new version of the app every time I make a change and I won't have to upload the build to play store and app store.
I know that it can be done because my bank app does something like this but I don't know how to do it or how to search for it
How can I achieve this?
Thanks and sorry for my english, I hope I have explained what I want to do
"Live updates" are one way to solve this. Live updates allow you to send patches to your app and actually change the app code to some extent without going through app store review. Big updates will still have to go through app store review, but you can make lots of little updates "live" by using a live update service.
You can do live updates with Ionic. Ionic is open-source, but the live updates are part of the Ionic team's Appflow package, which is a paid service. Pricing currently starts at $499/month for 25,000 updates.
In this same space, there's Capgo, which is cheaper and works with Capacitor in general (does not require Ionic).
More info: Long discussion on this topic in the capacitor-community github repo
Ionic is the framework that would fit your use case. You can build apps in angular and ionic wraps it in a webview of native android apps. If you need to access native android feature, you can install capacitor lib too along with ionic. Capacitor is a library to interact with mobile's api (IOS and Android) with javascript.
Anoter approach to build native android apps with JS would be reactnative. It is different from ionic. You would have to be familiar with react sytax to get statrted easily. React native is not a webview app rather it is compiled to native platform code.
Look into flutter too. It uses dart but apps perform faster made with flutter and it can build both for android and IOS with same codebase
CONCLUSION
If you want to stay in angular code, go with IONIC
Related
I am new to ionic framework. I have SPA build in .net mvc, angularjs & web api which a large web application. But all form are simple data entry forms with input and dropdowns. I want to build simple mobile app for not all but some forms using the same web api. I have googled and found that Ionic framework can do the work, but where should I start from? Need guidance on what type of app (native,web or hybrid) will be best for my purpose. I am looking for these few features.
Should be available for android, iOS and windows download.
Should have push notification.
Update the app without uninstalling.
Performance
Basically ionic use basic html components + ionic components + angularjs and that can be installed across iOS, Android, and Windows mobiles.
Also push notification also supported in ionic
updates are available without uninstall
and it gaves best performance for a small and basic functionality
now a days so many application build with hybrid platform like reactjs and ionic.
For your business purpose you can go with it definitely as it is a simple form submission and saves your time.
You can refer that links to see apps build with ionic framework:
http://showcase.ionicframework.com/apps/top
I have a problem. I need to build an ionic application but it has to be able to build a native app.
The idea is that the Ionic app can be used the kind of standalone. The data with the app needs has to come from the native language. But still, have to feel like it's a mobile app.
So let's say we already have an existing Native mobile app on Android. We just make a new tab there with a Webview. In the Webview, I can run my Ionic app but it still has to communicate with the Android app. Let's say the app needs local storage. Then the Ionic app needs to use the Native local storage from Android. So I have to config the local storage Native. Jet I only want to make the app only once for all the different platforms.
Is this possible? Are they any known ways to make this or any good plugins who can help me doing this?
no, webview not let code to communicate with android native functionality. your code in android webview cant communicate with you app's other functionalities.
I am using Ionic and Cordova to build a mobile app which will go on the iOS and Android stores. I have done this many times, and I really hate the process of having to update the app (specifically with Apple).
Would it be safe to dynamically load all of my templates and controllers from my server when the app loads, potentially caching them or having a server call to check if there is a new version? Basically, I would have all images and styles saved locally to the phone, but load the templates and controller code on app load.
And, if it was ok to do programmatically, are there any rules against this in Apple or Android's terms of use?
This is possible and there are tools like Cordova Hot Code Push to help you accomplish it. As long as you don't use this to break other app store review rules or significantly change the purpose of your app it's fine with Apple.
Please, am a web developer. I just built a web app for a school to manage their results and fees.
Now, i intend to build an app on android and ios so its 'easier' for both staff and students to get notifications and interact better.
Is JQuery mobile the asnwer?
Thanks for your reply
jQuery Mobile doesn't create an application for Android nor for iOS, it only makes websites look better on said platforms.
To create a real, native, application for Android you should use Android Studio. To do the same for iOS you need XCode and MAC OS X.
But, if you prefer to write websites, Apache Cordova does what you need. Allows you to create apps for any platform using your usual HTML, CSS and Javascript.
I'll drop the link here so you can check it out.
https://cordova.apache.org/
Another approach is creating a basic Android and iOS app that simply opens a web page (your website), but it is most of the time lacking in performance. If this last approach interests you, just look up "WebView" for Android, "UIWebView" for iOS (Obviously you'll need Android Studio and XCode)
EDIT
This is an old answer, now a ton of different technologies exist to build multiplatform applications, without even losing out on performance (for example, see react-native)
If you have already built the app using JQuery mobile and want to make it into an app I recommend looking at Cordova (PhoneGap) https://cordova.apache.org/
For notifications etc I found https://www.pushwoosh.com/ to have the best integration
This maybe a basic question, but I really wanted to ask it.
Consider a web application which is deployed on a cloud server and I want it to be available offline on a mobile(android device). Is it possible? Or will there be a separate installation on every mobile? How does phone gap or cordova help achieve it?
Yes it is possible. Cordova is an android application that has a webview (like a browser) for you to display an html app which is normally build with html+javascript. But cordova/phonegap applications should be made simpler than usual web application since smartphones has limited resources, unlike normal servers. There will be separate installation per mobile.
Phone Gap, Cordova etc. build native application, each user must install it to work offline. You can also build such native application manually by yourself with WebView. It can be easy to build but may require to changes in business logic to separate handle offline case, like store data locally and then sync when go online - this depend of application.