chrome/common/extensions/docs/templates/articles/app_intents.html

   1 <h1>Connect Apps with Web Intents</h1>
   2
   3 <p class="warning">
   4 <b>Warning: </b>
   5 Deprecated in Chrome 24.
   6 Web intents are no longer supported.
   7 </p>
   8
   9 <p>
  10 <a href="http://webintents.org/">Web Intents</a>
  11 allow your application to quickly communicate
  12 with other applications on the user's system and inside their browser.
  13 Your application can register to handle specific user actions
  14 such as editing images via the <code>manifest.json</code>;
  15 your application can also invoke actions to be handled by other applications.
  16 </p>
  17
  18 <p>Chrome Apps use Web Intents as their primary mechanism for inter-app
  19 communication.</p>
  20
  21 <h2 id="register">Register your app to handle an action</h2>
  22
  23 <p class="warning">
  24 <b>Warning: </b>
  25 Deprecated in Chrome 24.
  26 Web intents are no longer supported.
  27 </p>
  28
  29 <p>
  30 You must supply the intent in the manifest:
  31 </p>
  32
  33 <pre data-filename="manifest.json">
  34 "intents":{
  35  "http://webintents.org/edit" : [{
  36    "title" : "Best Image editing app",
  37    "type" : ["image/*"]
  38  }]
  39 }
  40 </pre>
  41
  42 <p>
  43 Unlike extensions and hosted apps, Chrome applications do not
  44 need a "href" attribute in the manifest declaration, this is
  45 because Chrome Apps have a single entry point for
  46 launch - the <code>onLaunched</code> event.
  47 </p>
  48
  49 <h2 id="content">Handling content types</h2>
  50
  51 <p class="warning">
  52 <b>Warning: </b>
  53 Deprecated in Chrome 24.
  54 Web intents are no longer supported.
  55 </p>
  56
  57 <p>
  58 Your application can be the user's preferred choice for handling a file type.
  59 For example, your application could handle viewing images or viewing pdfs.
  60 You must supply the intent in the manifest
  61 and use the "http://webintents.org/view" action:
  62 </p>
  63 <p>To be able declare your application's ability to view RSS and ATOM
  64 feeds, you would add the following to your manifest.
  65 </p>
  66 <pre data-filename="manifest.json">
  67 "intents": {
  68  "http://webintents.org/view" : [{
  69    "title" : "RSS Feed Reader",
  70    "type" : ["application/atom+xml", "application/rss+xml"]
  71  }]
  72 }
  73 </pre>
  74
  75 <p>
  76 Your application will receive intent payload through the <code>onLaunched</code> event.
  77 </p>
  78 <pre>
  79 chrome.app.runtime.onLaunched(function(intent) {
  80   // App Launched
  81   if(intent.action == "http://webinents.org/view" &amp;&amp;
  82      intent.type == "application/atom+xml") {
  83
  84     // obtain the ATOM feed data.
  85     var data = intent.data;
  86   }
  87 });
  88 </pre>
  89
  90 <h2 id="launching">Launching an app with a file</h2>
  91
  92 <p class="warning">
  93 <b>Warning: </b>
  94 Deprecated in Chrome 24.
  95 Web intents are no longer supported.
  96 </p>
  97
  98 <p>
  99 If your app handles the <code>view</code> intent,
 100 it is possible to launch it from the command line with a file as a parameter.
 101 </p>
 102 <pre>
 103 chrome.exe --app-id [app_id] [path_to_file]
 104 </pre>
 105 <p>
 106 This will implicity launch your application with an intent payload populated
 107 with the action set to "http://webintents.org/view", the type set to the
 108 mime-type of the file and the data as a <code>FileEntry</code> object.
 109 </p>
 110 <pre>
 111 chrome.app.runtime.onLaunched(function(intent) {
 112   // App Launched
 113   var data = intent.data;
 114 });
 115 </pre>
 116
 117 <h2 id="launching">Manipulating the file</h2>
 118
 119 <p class="warning">
 120 <b>Warning: </b>
 121 Deprecated in Chrome 24.
 122 Web intents are no longer supported.
 123 </p>
 124
 125 <p>
 126   When your application is launched with a file as the parameter
 127   on the command-line,
 128   the <code>intent.data</code> property is a <code>FileEntry</code>.
 129   This is really cool because now you have a direct reference back to the physical
 130   file on the disk,
 131   and you can write data back to it.
 132 </p>
 133
 134 <pre>
 135 chrome.app.runtime.onLaunched(function(intent) {
 136   // App Launched
 137   var data = intent.data;
 138   if(data instanceof FileEntry) {
 139     data.createWriter(function(writer) {
 140       writer.onwriteend = function(e) {
 141         console.log('Write completed.');
 142       };
 143
 144       writer.onerror = function(e) {
 145         console.log('Write failed: ' + e.toString());
 146       };
 147
 148       // Create a new Blob and write it to log.txt.
 149       var blob = new Blob(['Lorem Ipsum'], {type: 'text/plain'});
 150       writer.write(blob);
 151     });
 152   }
 153 });
 154 </pre>
 155
 156 <h2 id="return">Returning data to calling application</h2>
 157
 158 <p class="warning">
 159 <b>Warning: </b>
 160 Deprecated in Chrome 24.
 161 Web intents are no longer supported.
 162 </p>
 163
 164 <p>
 165 Lots of applications want to cooperate
 166 with the app that invoked them.
 167 It's easy to send data back to the calling client
 168 using <code>intent.postResult</code>:
 169 </p>
 170
 171 <pre>
 172 chrome.app.runtime.onLaunched(function(intent) {
 173   // App Launched
 174   console.log(intent.action);
 175   console.log(intent.type);
 176   var data = intent.data;
 177   // Do something with the data;
 178
 179   intent.postResult(newData);
 180 });
 181 </pre>
 182
 183 <h2 id="localize">Localizing your app title</h2>
 184
 185 <p class="warning">
 186 <b>Warning: </b>
 187 Deprecated in Chrome 24.
 188 Web intents are no longer supported.
 189 </p>
 190
 191 <p>
 192 If your application or extension is localized
 193 as per the guidelines in
 194 <a href="i18n">Internationalization (i18n)</a>,
 195 you can localize the title of your intent in the picker
 196 using the exact same infrastructure:
 197 </p>
 198
 199 <pre data-filename="manifest.json">
 200 "intents": {
 201  "http://webintents.org/edit" : [{
 202    "title" : "__MSG_intent_title__",
 203    "type" : ["image/*"],
 204    "disposition" : "inline"
 205  }]
 206 }
 207 </pre>
 208
 209 <h2 id="invoke">Invoking an action</h2>
 210
 211 <p class="warning">
 212 <b>Warning: </b>
 213 Deprecated in Chrome 24.
 214 Web intents are no longer supported.
 215 </p>
 216
 217 <p>
 218 If your application needs to be able
 219 to use the functionality of another application,
 220 it can simply ask the browser for it.
 221 To ask for an application that supports image editing,
 222 it's as simple as:
 223 </p>
 224
 225 <pre>
 226 var intent = new WebKitIntent("http://webintents.org/edit", "image/png", "dataUri://");
 227
 228 window.navigator.webkitStartActivity(intent, function(data) {
 229 // The data from the remote application is returned here.
 230 });
 231 </pre>
 232
 233 <h2 id="errors">Handling Errors and Exceptions</h2>
 234
 235 <p class="warning">
 236 <b>Warning: </b>
 237 Deprecated in Chrome 24.
 238 Web intents are no longer supported.
 239 </p>
 240
 241 <p>
 242    If your service application needs to signal to the client application
 243    that an unrecoverable error has occurred,
 244    then your application will need
 245    to call <code>postError</code> on the intent object.
 246    This will signal to the client’s onError callback
 247    that something has gone wrong.
 248 </p>
 249
 250 <h3 id="client">Client</h3>
 251
 252 <pre>
 253 var intent = new WebKitIntent("http://webintents.org/edit", "image/png", "dataUri://");
 254
 255 var onSuccess = function(data) {};
 256 var onError = function() {};
 257
 258 window.navigator.webkitStartActivity(intent, onSuccess, onError);
 259 </pre>
 260
 261 <h3 id="service">Service</h3>
 262 <pre>
 263 chrome.app.runtime.onLaunched(function(intent) {
 264   // App Launched
 265   console.log(intent.action);
 266   console.log(intent.type);
 267   var data = intent.data;
 268   // Do something with the data;
 269
 270   intent.postResult(newData);
 271 });
 272 </pre>
 273
 274 <p class="backtotop"><a href="#top">Back to top</a></p>