There’s a whole API that the browser provides to prompt users to install:

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Window/befo...

I’m not sure one can say Apple is intentionally making it difficult to install a web app to the Home Screen because they haven’t implemented a draft proposal to the w3c working group that proposes a spec only chrome has implemented and no other browser except chrome and its derivatives supports.

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goosejuice a day ago | parent [-]

https://mashable.com/article/apple-reverses-decision-home-sc...

Yes one can. They got greedy.

https://williamkennedy.ninja/apple/2024/01/30/steve-jobs-int...

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indidjdjendk a day ago | parent [-]

Yes and no.

“Add to Home Screen” living on the share menu is as insane as “Find on Page” living there. Which both do. And I don’t think there’s a master plan behind “find on page” being tucked away bafflingly on the share button.

It’s just bad UX. No conspiracy here.

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goosejuice a day ago | parent [-]

It's not a conspiracy that they once promoted PWAs as being the future and then reversed course so far as to removing the ability completely.

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tpmoney a day ago | parent [-]

They only removed it completely in a jurisdiction where they were being told that they had to open all of their internal APIs around web applications to all comers if they were going to use those APIs in their own applications. They claimed (whether you believe them or not) that doing so would open risks they didn’t want to take and so they removed it in that jurisdiction.

If this was some grand plan to stop the few hundred PWAs out there entirely, one would think they would have removed the PWA functionality in other less hostile jurisdictions where no law makers were looking to force a change. I could absolutely believe that the security risks were overblown, but if the assertion is Apple is trying to suppress PWAs, they’re doing a pretty bad job of it given they could just turn it off in the US and no one would blink an eye.

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goosejuice a day ago | parent [-]

Both of you are conflating conspiracy with incentives. They have no incentive to promote a distribution model outside of the confines of the app store where they make all their money.

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tpmoney a day ago | parent [-]

Sure I agree they have no incentive to promote them. But your claim wasn’t that they don’t promote them. You claimed that they’re making them exceedingly difficult to install. Apparently because they put the command for that in a consistent menu position for decades and removing the functionality temporarily in a single jurisdiction.

If they wanted to make it “exceedingly difficult” they could be disabling it in all jurisdictions, or hide it behind layers of developer mode dialogs and warnings. They could remove the instructions for how to do so from the on device help. They could require you to re-pin it every 3 days like they do for self loaded apps. They could stop adding support for newer PWA APIs as new ones get standardized and they could deprecate and remove APIs that already exist. We all know Apple isn’t precious about backwards compatibility.

If the goal is to make using a PWA “exceedingly difficult” Apple is failing miserably despite being very successful at making side-loading apps “exceedingly difficult”

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goosejuice a day ago | parent [-]

> “exceedingly difficult”

Who are you quoting?

But sure call me crazy for thinking it's user hostile to put install / add to home 5 taps deep into the menu. That has nothing to do with supporting a 2015 web API. They would go on to add smart app banners to promote native app store apps instead.

Edit: didn't realize smart app banner was 2012

	▲	tpmoney 19 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I apologize, it does seem like I misread and added the qualifier, you just claimed they made it “difficult”. My mistake. But I still disagree that it is “difficult” or “user hostile” to put the command to add a web app to your Home Screen 3 (not 5) taps away. Menu -> submenu -> command is not user hostile or difficult. The command is in the same place as all the other “do something with this page” commands. It’s not hidden behind toggles, it’s not buried in submenus away from other similar actions, it’s not in its own menu or an activity you have to leave safari for and initiate from the Home Screen instead. It takes just as many taps to change to a specific tab as it does to save a PWA