I have to build a multiplataform desktop app that loads any website that I want inside the desktop app, I dont want to open my google chrome or firefox.
Researching I came across Electron. It is possible to this in electron?
If it is possible, do I have any control over the web site, for example, can I spot all the forms and complete them with dummy data?
Related
When I'm on some websites (e.g. YouTube), On the address bar I see the icon of downloading this website as a desktop application. I would like to know how this happens or how the website can be a desktop application that easy? What's the logic behind this?
P.S: I'm using Google Chrome.
The icon that I'm talking about is here:
That is a PWA, which stands for Progressive Web App. You can install them as an application just like others. See MDN for more information.
I'm working on a test project to start learning about service workers and progressive web apps.
This project is hosted on github in https://github.com/Pablo-No/Privado1, however, when I download it as a progressive web app in a mobile phone some images aren't loaded correctly and alt text is shown instead, I don't know how to fix it, probably because I don't know how service workers and progresive web apps work, and that's why I'm working on this project.
In my computer it works perfectly, even when the app is downloaded without connection to internet (thanks to the service worker, I think). I've seen some similar issues, but I think they're different, however I may not be correct and I'm sorry if this issue has been answered yet.
I've used Chrome and Chrome mobile with the desktop and the mobile phone (the mobile phone uses android).
Actually I've made it works properly by using code in https://codelabs.developers.google.com/codelabs/your-first-pwapp . I hope this question and answer helps other people if they have the same issue.
I created a Web App(PWA) via React and Bootstrap. It runs perfectly. I planned to create an Android and another iOS Apps that have only one page with a Webview that loads my Web App via URL and ship those Apps to the customer.
My question is that there is a better and standard way to this? I heard about Hybrid Frameworks like IONIC but as I understand, IONIC Apps, Are web Apps that run on device not loaded from a URL, Is that right?
What I want is that my changes in the server affect all users and Apps installed on their devices. Because of that, I created the PWA App, not the Native App. I searched a lot but I can't reach a final decision.
Used to be I was an Android developer and had a lot of problems with shipping the latest version to the customer, Now I want to use Web-based technologies to reach Apps that works like a website.
The issue here is: you will not be able to use the devices resources if you load the PWA in a Webview. For example push notifications will not work. A PWA can be installed onto a phone and windows as an application. This will have push notification on Android and Windows but not on Mac or iOS (Safari is the new IE). You need to go Hybrid or back to Native if you need more.
You are right with IONIC. It is a wrapper for a webapp stored on the device but it allows us to use native features (push works on both Android and iOS). But you still have the distribution issue since you need to publish to the stores every version. Not even mentioning the hoops apple gets you through when you try to publish.
The good thing with IONIC is you have a single source code for multiple platforms and you can choose the library you want to build with. It used to be Angular but now you can choose ReactJS, Vue, Angular or ES. Which makes it way friendlier.
With IONIC you could build the native features and lazy load the rest as dynamic component from a url: stackoverflow question if you do not care about backward compatibility.
I did both PWA and IONIC. Both has their pros and cons.
If I do not care about iOS and Apple I would stay with PWA otherwise IONIC.
I'm considering building a mobile Web application, using Jquery Mobile that will be used to track truck delivery.
I want to be able to periodically send gps coordinates back to the server? Can this be done if the screen is off?
If not can some alternate approaches be suggested..
If you are good in javascript and html you can go for phonegap. this framework will work like a native application and running from webview like browser. Since phonegap is a cross platform framework you can make your app compatible to many devices like windows phone, Apple, Android. To know more about phonegap or cordova click here
And yes phonegap does many function or features that can customize your application in many way. for example "WAKE LOCK" which keeps your application awake till you force close it.
or if you are using browser you can not run your code for long since browser is a big application android or your mobile system will close it.
I want to build 1 UI for several phones (windows phone, Android, IPhone, etc).
My plan is to create an HTML5 UI, and use JS to invoke applications that are installed on the mobile device.
For example, I create windows phone 7 application without UI, and invoke functions of this application from the JS in the HTML 5 UI.
Same goes for android, IPhone, etc.
Is this plan feasible at all?
- How can I call windows phone 7 silverlight app/Android from JS?
Calling a native app from the browser is
possible on iOS: Opening Native App. from Safari
possible on Android: Launch custom android application from android browser
impossible on Windows Phone 7
On iOS, you can't create a web app that calls native code, period. You mention that you want the app to have no UI, so I'm assuming you want to have a web app that invokes native code which in turn causes something to happen in the web app, or even causes something to happen on the device. Won't happen. You can use the iPhone's Custom URL Scheme to LAUNCH an application with given parameters so that when it opens it immediately does something, but you will get kicked out of the browser and in to your app. And App Store Guidelines wouldn't let you make an app that has no UI. It also doesn't allow for the creation of apps that are just WebViews wrapped around HTML.
On Android, I would imagine that you could create an app that is nothing more than a WebView that loads your webapp, and in that way you would have access to the native code you wrote for the device, but I don't think that would meet up in the middle the way you want it to when it comes to having the native code manipulate your web app. Plus Android UI's are mostly XML with a little bit of backing code so at that point you may as well be making a native app.
The browser in Windows Phone 7 does not currently support HTML5, though it is expected to arrive later this year. That said, I would extremely surprised if there was ever a public API that enabled a web site to open an application on the host device and I'd be surprised if this was allowed on Android or iPhone, too.
The only application that I'm aware of that exhibits this behavior is the YouTube application. If you visit YouTube.com on the WP7 browser, then it either launches the YouTube app if you have it installed, or prompts yout to download and install it. So, the capability is there, but I doubt very strongly if Microsoft would ever open it up beyond a close partnership for specific applications.
In Windows Phone 7, you can use the WebBrowser control within an application to host/browse web content, and from the application you can call javascript methods exposed by that page as described by Shawn Wildermuth in his Navigating with the WebBrowser Control on WP7 post.