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There is a conflict between support for classical shortcuts on Android Home screen and PWA support

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  • 1 has this problem
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  • Last reply by Paul

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From the very beginning, Android Firefox allows us to create home screen shortcuts with the URL of the current tab. Since then, I've been using this to pin important pages to the home screen. However, the implemented support for Progressive Web Apps (PWA) has critically impacted the ability to pin web pages to the home screen as Firefox shortcuts. The thing is, when Firefox detects a manifest.json file on a website, the “Add to Home screen” menu item is replaced by “Install” item, and Firefox creates a shortcut for the PWA, not for the current URL opened in the tab. PWA shortcuts refer to a URL defined in the manifest as the start_url value. This way, the creators of manifest.json have complete control over which page will open when the PWA starts up. The most web sites that want us to install the PWA, such as: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/ , https://www.cbc.ca/ , and https://www.spiegel.de/ and many others, use the main page of their site as the start_url value. S0 if I open a page, for example, “About CBC News” with the URL https://www.cbc.ca/news/about-cbc-news-1.1294364, and create a Home Screen shortcut, this shortcut will navigate to the URL https://www.cbc.ca/?utm_source=web_app_manifest and open the CBC home page in PWA window instead of the “About CBC News” page. The same will be true for any of the three sites listed above: The Globe and Mail, CBC, and Spiegel. The shortcut will open the home pages of these sites as a PWA window. I don't see the point in such a PWA, because if we need to open the main page of news sites, we can use the Firefox bookmarks, collections or pinned sites. So, I highly suggest the following. When a site contains a manifest.json file, let users decide whether they want a classic Firefox shortcut or a PWA shortcut. I believe the simplest implementation would be to use two separate menu items: “Add to Home screen” for regular shortcuts and “Install” for PWAs. Then the user could make a choice.

From the very beginning, Android Firefox allows us to create home screen shortcuts with the URL of the current tab. Since then, I've been using this to pin important pages to the home screen. However, the implemented support for Progressive Web Apps (PWA) has critically impacted the ability to pin web pages to the home screen as Firefox shortcuts. The thing is, when Firefox detects a manifest.json file on a website, the “Add to Home screen” menu item is replaced by “Install” item, and Firefox creates a shortcut for the PWA, not for the current URL opened in the tab. PWA shortcuts refer to a URL defined in the manifest as the start_url value. This way, the creators of manifest.json have complete control over which page will open when the PWA starts up. The most web sites that want us to install the PWA, such as: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/ , https://www.cbc.ca/ , and https://www.spiegel.de/ and many others, use the main page of their site as the start_url value. S0 if I open a page, for example, “About CBC News” with the URL https://www.cbc.ca/news/about-cbc-news-1.1294364, and create a Home Screen shortcut, this shortcut will navigate to the URL https://www.cbc.ca/?utm_source=web_app_manifest and open the CBC home page in PWA window instead of the “About CBC News” page. The same will be true for any of the three sites listed above: The Globe and Mail, CBC, and Spiegel. The shortcut will open the home pages of these sites as a PWA window. I don't see the point in such a PWA, because if we need to open the main page of news sites, we can use the Firefox bookmarks, collections or pinned sites. So, I highly suggest the following. When a site contains a manifest.json file, let users decide whether they want a classic Firefox shortcut or a PWA shortcut. I believe the simplest implementation would be to use two separate menu items: “Add to Home screen” for regular shortcuts and “Install” for PWAs. Then the user could make a choice.

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Hi,

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