

WebIntents are Links 2.0 - julien
http://blog.superfeedr.com/webintents-links2/

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readme
The main problem I suffer from as an Android developer with intents (in
Android) is that applications inconsistently implement them.

For example, I can send an intent off to send an email. Then, any email
application on the device that has declared itself as able to receive that
intent with an <intent-filter>, can respond to it.

The problem is that there is no way for the response to be standardized.
Applications often give you back different results for the same intents, that
lack the extras you expected, or don't respond at all.

The end result is when you try to use an intent to add a cool feature to your
app, you run into the problem of the user potentially having an app installed
that doesn't handle it correctly, but publishes itself as able to do so.

The aftermath is that the user tries to use this app, then when it doesn't
work, to them it is a bug with _my_ app. When there's really not a thing I can
do about it.

Does Web Intents address this issue at all?

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bookwormAT
this problem is new to me as well, both as a user and a developer. Usually,
data that is sent between events is very simple, and if an application
registeres for an event that it does not handle well, then it is mostly
transparent what application has to be replaced.

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readme
Try sending some emails to multiple recipients using ACTION_SENDTO and a
properly crafted URI.

Watch the SMS app show on some phones when using Intent.createChooser and
totally misinterpret the intent to the astonishment of the user.

You wouldn't see this problem if you didn't test on a LOT of phones.

It's not immediately obvious. I've been developing for Android for a while
now.

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systemizer
Very cool; I forgot about web intents for a while, but this is very
encouraging. Who will build the extension to rule them all?

Example use cases where file is at an arbitrary URL: 1\. Save a file - saves
file in your dropbox. 2\. favorite a song - music service (i.e. soundcloud)
saves to your favorites 3\. get copy of code repo - forks the repo for you on
a versioning system service (i.e. github) 4\. register for event - adds event
to your scheduling service (i.e. plancast, google calendar)

What other ideas can you think of?

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AffableSpatula
No, WebIntents are just plain Links:

<intent action="<http://webintents.org/share> type="image/ _"
href="share.html" disposition="window|inline" / >

<link rel="<http://webintents.org/share> type="image/_" href="share.html"
disposition="window|inline" />

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alttab
I might not understand the full problem this is solving. Is it to get rid of
all the social bookmarking buttons on blogs? Something tells me only being
supported in chrome, and having to literally download an app to share seems
rather silly. Unless a large portion of the intended audience is tech-centric
or cares about this thing, bloggers will now have intent plugins and social
sharing plugins.

So I'll state my original point- there has to be more leverage behind web
intents that I'm missing? Does anyone have good links that may shed more
light?

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kinlan
The bigger picture is that it is not about Sharing, it's about connecting web-
apps.

The goal is that users will not know about or need to know about intents, they
just get the flexibility to use the services that they prefer to use in the
apps and sites that they visit.

For developers it is about not having to create or build native, or tightly
coupled integrations to a select few services. The app just asks for a service
and the browser knows the list that the user can use.

The "download" or install part you mention is just for now whilst we get the
intent tag and other discovery mechanisms landed.

If you look at AddThis, they offer support for intents in their widget, so it
is not aimed at being tech centric at all.

I would also add that we are not finished yet, there is still a lot to do such
as setting defaults, and building explicit intents (let the dev define the
endpoint of the action) and also getting more apps to provide or integrate
with services.

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pwpwp
Is there a relation to registerProtocolHandler, somehow?

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kinlan
short answer. Yes and there will be integration between RPH, RCH and intents.

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AndrewDucker
Any news on when Firefox is shipping support for them?

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kinlan
Mozilla are working on a very similar implementation at the moment in
Boot2Gecko. I personally hope to see this be brought inline with Intents with
feedback about what they have learnt in the process.

Web Intents does have a compatibility JS shim, it needs a couple of updates to
get it working in FF again after implementing Content Security policy, but
after that WI should work fine (but not native).

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robmcm
This is great, but for it to really be useful it needs wide spread support. Or
a decent fallback I guess.

~~~
kinlan
Fallback we have the shim. Decent Fallback? I need to fix it for FF. I am
working on the eco-system now :)

