iOS9: Try to open app via scheme if possible, or redirect to app store otherwise

Question

My question is about iOS9 only!

I have an HTML landing page, and I try to redirect the user to my app via URL scheme if the app is installed, or redirect to the Appstore otherwise.

My code is:

document.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded", function(event) {

  var body = document.getElementsByTagName('body')[0];
  body.onclick = function () {
    openApp();
  };
});

var timeout;

function preventPopup() {

    clearTimeout(timeout);
    timeout = null;
    window.removeEventListener('pagehide', preventPopup);
}

function openApp(appInstanceId, platform) {

  window.addEventListener('pagehide', preventPopup);
  document.addEventListener('pagehide', preventPopup);

  // create iframe
  var iframe = document.createElement("iframe");
  document.body.appendChild(iframe);
  iframe.setAttribute("style", "display:none;");
  iframe.src = 'myscheme://launch?var=val';

  var timeoutTime = 1000;
  timeout = setTimeout(function () {

    document.location = 'https://itunes.apple.com/app/my-app';

  }, timeoutTime);
}

The problem is that the iframe trick doesn't work in Safari iOS9.

Any idea why?

My iframe trick based on this answer.

Answer 1

The iframe trick no longer works -- my guess is that Apple knows it will encourage more developers to implement Universal Links, more quickly.

You can still set window.location='your-uri-scheme://'; and fallback to the App Store after 500ms. There is a "dance" between popups if you take this approach, as we do at Branch (we do as a fallback if Universal Links don't work).

window.location = 'your-uri-scheme://'; // will result in error message if app not installed
setTimeout(function() {
   // Link to the App Store should go here -- only fires if deep link fails                
   window.location = "https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/myapp/id123456789?ls=1&mt=8";
}, 500);

I wish I had a better answer for you. iOS 9 is definitely more limited.

For a helpful overview of what's needed for Universal Links should you go that route, check out my answer here or read this tutorial