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A comment on Apple confirms iOS 17.4 removes Home Screen web apps in the EU. Parent comment

Re:Apple confirms iOS 17.4 removes Home Screen web apps in t... by adrr on Thursday February 15, 2024 @02:30PM (#39387342)
Its not honest. PWA has the same functionality as standard web app. You still need to grant permissions like Microphone Access, Camera access. Only difference is that a PWA has a manifest which defines appearance, splash screens, localization. Here's the starbucks PWA which is one the most popular PWAs.

https://app.starbucks.com/

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Re:Apple confirms iOS 17.4 removes Home Screen web apps in t... by threeseed on Thursday February 15, 2024 @02:44PM (#39387557)
> You still need to grant permissions like Microphone Access, Camera access

"including isolation of storage and enforcement of system prompts to access privacy impacting capabilities on a per-site basis"

One scenario is that today there is one instance of WebKit owned by the Home Screen process shared amongst all of the PWA apps which is enforcing that prompt. With third party engines that prompt would appear for the first app invocation but not any subsequent ones.

This is only an issue with PWA since for normal apps the browser process is per-app rather than shared.

Now they could rewrite the Home Screen execution environment to support one engine per app but their argument is that it's not worth their effort.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Apple confirms iOS 17.4 removes Home Screen web apps in t... by adrr on Thursday February 15, 2024 @04:25PM (#39389135)
You run the apps in the context of the default browser app. The same way Mac OS does PWAs.
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Re:Apple confirms iOS 17.4 removes Home Screen web apps in t... by _factor on Wednesday February 21, 2024 @01:43PM (#39457715)
Try comparing that pwa to the native app and you'll soon find that most navigation ends up with quasi browser bars that obstruct the UI and slow the experience down.

Apple surely does this on purpose to prevent PWAs from being useful. Can't let any App store competition arise.

[ Parent | on HN ]