What would be the easiest way for me to set up a Chrome extension that starts when I log in to my Windows account, and can be connected to a WebSocket server to check for, say, new messages, and then pop open a desktop notification, that clicks to the messages web page?
I expect that making an extension is straight forward, as well as getting it to communicate with WebSockets, and making the desktop notification.
But what about making it automatically start when I log in to the computer? What would be a good way to do this in Windows? I am not interested in having the chrome browser to open up at log in, but I certainly don't mind if I see Chrome in the task bar.
You might look into chrome.runtime.onStartUp: https://developer.chrome.com/apps/runtime#event-onStartup, which is
"Fired when a profile that has this extension installed first starts up."
Also, you can use chrome.alarms to schedule a function to run every minute or so, to open a WebSocket somewhere, etc.
The app may try to unload itself if there are no active windows, so you can call some action in chrome.runtime.onSuspend (like loading an XHR somewhere) to cause onSuspendCanceled to trigger.
Related
Would appreciated help on a gap in comprehension. Sending push notifications to Chrome running on a Windows 10 machine (tried on older Windows also) results in the notifications popping up only when the Chrome browser is open (similarly for installing the page as a PWA). On numerous sites and posts it says that Chrome can run a background process even when the browser is closed and still receive notifications that will kick off the browser or the PWA.
Have reviewed a number of posts from back in 2015/2016 which don't appear relevant based on current state of service workers, PWAs. Have also looked at the W3C spec and Chromium post on design and architecture which don't really seem to cover how the host OS (e.g., Windows) invokes the browser.
The Chrome browser is set to run in the background (setting->advanced->Continue running background apps when Google Chrome is closed) but on closing Chrome and looking at the running processes on the system, there does not seem to a Chrome background thread running (i.e., it does not seem that Chrome inherently runs some background process). Push notifications (e.g., sent via OneSignal) which result in the appropriate page being opened when Chrome is already open or the PWA receiving the notification (we are currently using GCM not FCM if that makes a difference) if it is open, do not seem to kick off the chrome browser if it is not already running. Otherwise the notifications are processed correctly.
From the google developer site and OneSignal documentation, etc, I had somewhat assumed (apparently incorrectly) that having a service worker for push notification would somehow create a background process environment.
So, the question is, what is required to keep Chrome running in the background to be able to receive the push notifications? Can it be done with a service worker? If the code is in a PWA is that different? Is a Chrome extension required? though having to create an extension would seem contrary to the point of creating the service workers and making the app a PWA.
I note also that it posts indicate that with Firefox this is not possible as Firefox completely exits on close with no background processes.
Any thoughts would be appreciated.
I am trying to build a PWA. I managed to trigger the prompt a first time and installed the app on my shell (desktop). I then deleted it and I would like to force the prompt to reappear (for debug purpose) but it won't.
I set my chome flag Bypass user engagement checks to enabled, but there's still nothing I can do to trigger the prompt.
When I click on the console setting Application>Manifest>Add to homescreen, nothing happens and I don't receive any error message either.
It's exactly the same code that worked the first time. I just want to trigger it again now that the desktop shortcut has been deleted.
Also struggled with this issue.
At last found that going to chrome://apps/ and removing the app will enable to re-add it
If the chrome://flags/#bypass-app-banner-engagement-checks flag is enabled and you are still not getting the banner, its high likely one of PWA criteria is not met anymore.
It might have worked before. But with the changing code, something might have went wrong with Service worker, accessing via HTTP instead of HTTPS or having an invalid certificate kind if issues might have made your app not eligible for App install banner.
Validate: Validate your current sites PWA eligibility using Chrome Developer tools -> Audits -> Perform Audit -> Progressive Web App. See if all goes through regarding PWA criteria and if you see all looks good and still you don't get the Install Banner, post the Audit screenshot to give us some idea on whats going on.
You can just also just set it in the Developer Tools under Application by checking on Update on reload or click on Unregister to completely remove the SW. Dirty, but does the trick all the time.
I am currently working on a video web application. We rely on notification to notify provider there is call in.
Firebase works well even when I close the tab. I found that if there is any chrome's thread running in background, I will get notification.
Is there any way that I can make a background thread active even the user click close button on chrome? how about chrome extension? does it approach the goal?
Firebase Cloud Messaging for web relies on a service worker to receive messages when the web app is not active/visible. This requires that Chrome is active.
If the user completely quits Chrome, all tabs, service workers and extensions are stopped. There is no way to still receive web push notifications in that case.
We're developing a website which sends push notifications to end users using GCM. We've gone through Service Worker and all. We have developed a prototype using this codelab tutorial. It is working so far, but the only issue is the notifications are displayed only when Chrome is opened. When Chrome is closed, the notifications don't reach the users.
I want to know is there any way we can overcome this and display the notifications even when the browser is closed, similar to Safari Push Notification. Thanks in advance!
If you have a "background" permission in manifest.json, your background page will be able to show notifications even when Chrome window is closed.
"permissions": [
"background"
],
As stated in the documentation:
When any installed hosted app, packaged app, or extension has "background" permission, Chrome runs (invisibly) as soon as the user logs into their computer—before the user launches Chrome. The "background" permission also makes Chrome continue running (even after its last window is closed) until the user explicitly quits Chrome.
You need to use the "background" permission with a background page, event page or a background window for hosted apps.
For web, use Push API for Chrome and other browsers. The advantage of using push messages is that even if your page is closed, your service worker will be woken up and be able to show a notification. Web Sockets and EventSource have their connection closed when the page or browser is closed so it's not recommended. Here is the documentation and example.
In Chrome. Only those users that happen to have an extension installed that requires background mode, like hangouts, will be able to receive push notifications when chrome is not "running". It does not seem like a good idea to rely on it.
The chrome team seems to be considering it for web push too but so far there is no ETA.
https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=402456
Showing notification when the browser or tab is closed requires the service worker and a third party service (like google firebase)to trigger the service worker.
https://github.com/web-push-libs/ - Check these list of libraries to implement this in different platforms.
https://github.com/rijoshrc/php-service-worker-push-notification - Clone this git repository to see the simple implementation in PHP.
I am using GoogleApis to upload documents to Google Drive using the InsertMediaUpload class from the FilesResource namespace and the Upload method. It is working well for me with the following exception:
After calling InsertMediaUpload, a browser window appears asking the user to log into their Google (usually Gmail) account. If the user simply closes the browser window instead of clicking on "Accept" or "Cancel" then the current process appears to be hung. I suppose there should a timeout of a minute or two so that if the user opts to not log in the current windows application will not simply hang and stop working indefinitely.
There is no need for sample code here. What should happen when the user simply closes the browser window instead of clicking cancel if they are no longer interested in uploading a document? Crashing (or hanging) the current process should not be a possibility, but that is what occurs. One would hope closing the browser window would have the same effect as clicking the cancel button -- just another way of opting out of an upload to Google Drive, right?
Thanks in advance for any help with this.
You're not supposed to get authentication message from InsertMediaUpload class. You should handle authentication by yourself. Authentication browser window you get is for your development convenience, not for production code. Please take a look at .net quickstart. In this quickstart, you'll see GetAuthorization method which handles authentication. Modify this method on your needs and you'll get what you want.