I'm looking to build an android app based off a mobile site. Basically, I just need an app with a browser that I can use as a platform.
Many of the "build an app online" sites offer this, where you just put in the home url etc, but they all include their own ads etc.
Any ideas where to start?
If you want to make your own simple app without Ads, use just a WebView inside of a simgle activity layout set to fill the screen.
Doing this you will eliminate all ads, as well as have the ability to add in more features later on if you so choose.
If you just want to create a launcher icon that will open up the default browser to your sites page, you can do that by just starting a browser intent, and then closing the actual app.
This will allow you to have an app icon and play store listing, however the only thing that iw will do is bring the user to your website like you have mentioned.
Create an Activity with a WebView.
I think you're looking for an app that displays a WebView. However, that will only display the website as if you were looking at it in a mobile browser such as Android Chrome.
If you want the data from a mobile site, without anything else, then you have to hope that the site provides that, or you have to download its HTML and scrape it.
Related
I have a WordPress website and I am transforming this website to a PWA with the help of a plugin.
The PWA is working as expected: notifications, working without internet …
I have also followed this tutorial completely:
https://css-tricks.com/how-to-get-a-progressive-web-app-into-the-google-play-store/
At the end, I have an Android launcher.
The new app is doing this:
If the browser is not set by default, it will ask the user to choose a browser.
I have an URL bar at the top of the app.
The app is not working without internet.
How can I fix all those points?
If the browser is not set by default, it will ask the user to choose a browser
Can't get this one, every mobile phone already do that by default, I think.
I have an URL bar on top of the app
Check if you have included the tag:
"display": "standalone"
on the manifest.json file
the app is not working without internet.
Check your service-worker.js file to see the resources needed to provide an offline experience are effectively cached. One can use this nice tool from Google to define routes policy easily.
You can use this Helpful tool.
Not installed yet
A URL bar being still visible at the top is indicative that the web page has not been installed yet as a PWA on your device. Choose Install from the tab menu or click on a [↓] icon next to the URL bar.
This will most probably also solve your other problems.
I'm a First time developer who is developing a basic WebView based app for android devices. I have some links that lead to profiles on facebook, twitter & instagram etc. At the moment whenever these links are clicked the relevant profiles open but in website form and not app. How can I make these links open the relevant app instead of the website. For example whenever I click on instagram it loads the mobile website for instagram instead of launching the actual app. Also if I have a telephone number set using href="tel: how can I set it to launch the phone app with the telephone number filled in. Sorry if these are stupid questions but I am very new to app development and am still learning. Many thanks for your time.
You will need to use the application specific URL schemes:
A good read on what this is:
https://fokkezb.nl/2013/08/26/url-schemes-for-ios-and-android-1/
Once you understand what this is you will need to do some research to find the URL scheme and correct url for every app you want to target
Example: fb://profile/
Phone number this might work: 2125551212
I have an android application say Sample App. I want to add App Links according to Android Developer Guide. I was successful in implementing them, but there was an problem with Chrome. When I access the corresponding Sample Web App and there is <a> tag with href="https://www.sample.com/profile" and it's also supported by App, it opens in app instead of continuing in Chrome.
I checked documentation and it is supposed to be default behavior of Chrome. But then I came across Linkedin app. The My Network tab they have when clicked in browser continues in browser but same link if I save to docs or any other application and click it then it opens in native app.
I want to know how this is done?
I believe this is because, as you said, the standard deep linking behavior is to route to the app if it is installed. This behavior is handed-off immediately when the link is clicked because your app overriders that url to be handled by app instead of Chrome.
First, I believe that you should route users to your application because its a better, more engaging experience, presumably.
If you are convinced, then I would change your manifest to strictly handle links that you want to handle. See this post to see how to handle only certain links.
I want to build an android app, that display web sites, but instead of displaying it in normal browser (e.g. Google chrome), i want to display it in my app window.
I am thinking, for each site, my app will call separate chrome window, so it will open in a chrome, but in my app.
What do you think?
Thanks all for ur help
I have a responsive website which can be accessed across multiple devices, our design and application is mainly targeted for mobile users.
To ease access to the site, we want to create a launch icon which will apear on the mobile home screen and user can access the site using one touch, as against launching the browser and typing the url / opening the bookmarked page.
I found a solution for it in IOS, which is also supported by the safari browser using which you can save the page url as a launch icon, can a similar feature be found on a android device? I would also be interested in prompting the users to create the launch icon if they are accessing it from a mobile phone /tablet.
Default Android
This is the preferred way since this is all based on default Android options and doesn't add any maintenance.
As a widget from bookmarks
If on android you long press the home screen and then select the widget option you can create a bookmark. This will let you select a bookmark from your chrome bookmarks to be linked on the desktop. If that works for you you're all set with default Android features. The icon from the bookmark is used on the desktop.
Directly from Chrome
Similar to this approach is selecting the "Add to homescreen" option in the chrome settings menu.
The icon is the icon from the website.
Custom alternative
As stated before the alternative is to create an app that only serves the purpose of being a link to your mobile website. Then you have 2 options:
Using default browser of user
An app that uses intents to open the default browser of the user with your URL. This should be the way to go since the user can now keep on using his favorite browser.
In app browser
An app that contains a single webview loading the URL of your webapp. This last option gives you more control over the browsing experience (blocking scripts, overriding requests, ...). However the user can no longer use his preferred browser.
About the icon
In both cases the Icon will be the icon configured and distributed within the app. This also introduce the need of a new app release if the icon or the URL should change.
About the code
Code examples and information about this webapp in app approach can be found at http://developer.android.com/guide/webapps/webview.html
Another good resource is https://developers.google.com/chrome/mobile/docs/webview/overview where mobile app development using a native android app with webview is covered with several aspects like tools, css tricks and more.
If I have understood your issue exactly then you would want to show a launcher icon for your website without creating any activity (screen) or doing any programming in android.
If this is the case then my answer is YES, as depicted in snap Google chrome provides this functionality to create a launcher/app icon on home screen.
Some webBrowsers like chrome enable the user to make a bookmark for a specific URL as an icon in the home screen, but I did not get evolved in a project like that. So it is possible.
You can make it simple by creating an application that contain only a webview to open your url and you can then create an icon for your app that hold the website on the home screen as the following in this answer
In my 3 years on Android I have never seen a website ask me to make a shortcut on my homescreen, however, the standard Android browser as well as Dolphin can create shortcuts from bookmarks.
While researching this with a quick search I found this thread states that Chrome allows this as well, and there's even a way to specify a homescreen icon for your users.