Google Play Store Now Open For Progressive Web Apps (medium.com) 49
Maximiliano Firtman: Chrome 72 for Android shipped the long-awaited Trusted Web Activity feature, which means we can now distribute PWAs in the Google Play Store! I played with the feature for a while, digging into the APIs and here you have a summary of what's going on, what to expect and how to use it today. Chrome 72 for Android is now shipping from the Play Store to all users and this version included Trusted Web Activity (TWA), that in a nutshell is a way to open Chrome in standalone mode (without any toolbar or Chrome UI) within the scope of our own native Android package. Let me start saying that the publishing process is not straightforward as it should be (such as "enter your URL" in the Play Console and it's done). It's also not a way to use the currently available WebAPK and publish it in the store. It's a Java API that communicates through services with Chrome and seem to be in the early stages, so there is a lot of manual work to do yet today.
More liberal bias (Score:5, Funny)
What about the Conservative Web Apps?
Progressive != Liberal (Score:2)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
A liberal bias might actually be a good thing, as it would err on the side of free speech, and against totalitarianism.
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What evidence do you have of that last bit? All I hear from liberals is how they are going to ban speech they don't like, steal money from people and give it to others, and create an all-pervasive central government. They have to, in order to force people who have different ideas to go along by force of law.
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Google-free android? (Score:3)
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Trusted Web Activity = Trusted by Google. By definition they will not be degoogled because <sarcasm> doing so would make Google distrust and block them. </sarcasm> the only reason that it's required in the first place is because Google decreed it so.
There's no reason to require some trust anchor to load a predetermined web URL in a limited browser. Especially when said predetermined URL was installed by an a
Instruction sets differ (Score:2)
Good luck running native code when the instruction set of your device's CPU, such as ARM vs. MIPS vs. x86-64 (Atom) vs. RISC-V, differs from those of the devices in the app's developer's testing fleet.
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PWAs use a new "API" in Chrome, really just some basic hooks that tell it to open without the usual address bar and other controls. They are all published and available for other browsers to implement, which doesn't see to be a lot of work.
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PWA has always worked in modern browers. This is just a new feature to allow users to find them in the Play Store. If you don't have the Play Store, it has no effect on you.
In related news ... (Score:2)
Dear Slashdot (Score:5, Insightful)
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One difference is that ActiveX used native code, whereas Progressive Web Apps use JavaScript and/or WebAssembly with the Service Worker and IndexedDB APIs and the HTML DOM.
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My goodness, thanks but no thanks. Now that I know it is just the latest attempt at "push" apps, I'd like the 10 seconds I spent at wikipedia back.
Ridiculing it without knowing what it was turns out to have been a good idea.
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I have been programming for a few decades, I work on software, firmware, hardware, and deal with many parts of the company. I fully read the summary, and had no clue what it was about. Didn't even sound like technology, sounded more like marketing.
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I'm hoping they were talking about Free Software or something.
I get my apps from fdroid.
Re:Dear Slashdot (Score:5, Informative)
They are web sites for people who think they need an app.
The rational is that users think they need an app, and go looking for one in the Play store. Rather than just go to Facebook.com, they think they have to have the Facebook app. So to save time and money, you can make a Facebook app that is just a wrapper for Facebook.com.
Well, you could do that before, but now it's a bit more "native" and benefits from using the browser that is already loaded into memory etc.
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My PWA works without those things (although maps and a few other features don't work without Javascript.)
https://www.transsee.ca/ [transsee.ca]
An app that's always on the web (Score:2)
Learn to code software for the smart phone.
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That's some smart code
deep learning you on your phone
always for the web
A million monkeys coding (Score:2)
So why do these exists (Score:2)
1. Is not needed.
2. Is a fix for a problem they caused.
You can write a simple HTML page without Googles help.
Is this anything else except locking for displaying ads.