Web App Overview

Push Notifications

Push notifications allow you to send notifications through a browser to a person.  This notification appears in the bottom right of your computer regardless of if you have the specific page open, or even the browser in focus.  For example, you might have setup a push notification in Chrome for a website, and you are browsing in Firefox.  The push notification will show even while you are using Firefox.  You might have seen Facebook using push notifications.  In order to use Push Notifications you have to have SSL installed on your site.

Push Notifications With Chrome

For push notifications to work with Chrome you will need to register with Google Cloud Messaging which handles sending push notifications.  The reason for this so that a notification can be sent to a person regardless of whether or not they have your website open.  A notification is sent to Google Cloud Messaging which in turn sends the message to the member's Google Chrome application so that it appears without them being on your website.  Below is a guide on how to register for push notifications.
https://developers.google.com/web/fundamentals/getting-started/push-notifications/step-04?hl=en

Push Notifications With Firefox

Firefox does not require registration to send push notifications to their messaging service that redirects the notification to the members Firefox browser.

Push Notifications With Android Phones

For Web Apps you may also need to have the web app registered and installed through Google's app store. According to their documentation this is required for push notifications to android phones, however, I'm not sure if an android phone that has Chrome installed will allow push notifications without having to install the web app through Google's app store.  I will update this document once I've been able to test and confirm (unfortunately I do not have an android phone, if you have one and want to help with testing please contact us).  In any event, it is still important to register your app with Google's app store in order to allow the web app to be installed as an icon on the member's phone.

Push Notifications With Apple Products

For an iPhone or iPad you must have a native app in order to do push notifications.  For Apple computers you can do push notifications without having a native app, similar to how it is done with Chrome.  You do have to register with Apple to do this.  At this time we have not set up push notifications for Apple computers but we are interested in doing it.  If you have an Apple computer and are interested in helping with testing please let us know.

Testing and Seeing Updates

One thing that makes web apps a real pain is testing and seeing changes from updates.  For example, if you change the logo used by your web app you may have a hard time seeing the new logo.  Clearing your cache is not enough.  This is because web app content/data is stored in your offline content which is something separate from the normal cache.

It is typically MUCH easier to test the web app out first in your browser.  It is easier to clear the cache to see changes in a browser.  Also, that way you can get it how you want it and then once it is done test on a phone to confirm it works as expected.  Doing this way to first get the app setup how you want it (text, logo, content, etc) will save a lot of heartache.

Below are instructions for clearing a web app's cache in FireFox:
Go to "Options"
Go to "Advanced -> Network".
From there clear BOTH web content AND Offline Web Content.  NOTE: You need to keep clearing the button until FireFox says you are using 0 bytes of disk space.  For my Firefox I have to click 2-3x normally.  Others have told me they have the same problem of having to click MULTIPLE times for it to fully clear
You may also want to go to privacy and clear cookies.
Please note, that this doesn't clear out the local storage data (database content such as your contacts that are stored offline in the app).  I will add a button on the contact us page of the web app for clearing this data as doing it through FireFox is a real maze and involves working around database code.  Fortunately I can clear local storage from within the app, but I can't clear the cache so you will always need to do the steps above.

Below are instructions for clearing a web app's cache on an iPhone
- Remove the app
- Go to Settings -> Safari
From there click:
Clear History
Clear Cookies and Data
Then from there click Advanced -> Website Data
And from there at bottom click "Remove All Website Data"

For other phones it depends on the phone and you may have to search for instructions.  Keywords to look out for are "Website Data" or "Offline Content".


ADVANTAGES OF WEB APPS
A very big advantage is that it is done using html, javascript and css.  So using these technologies that most developers are familiar with you can make a web app.
Also, since using this technology, you don't have to write a separate web app for each type of phone.  For example, before web apps if you wanted to write a mobile app you would need to use several different languages.  A different language for each type of phone (Android, iPhone, Windows, BlackBerry, etc)
You can do a web app that works on iPhone's without having to use Apple's developer program which costs $100/mo and is needed in order to submit a web app to them.  Also, you don't have to wait for them to approve the app which from online articles I've read takes months, and is hard as they typically reject most apps submitted to them.  For example, if you want a basic web app with information about your business/product you can do it and have it work on an iPhone, whereas you couldn't do a traditional mobile app this way because Apple doesn't approve one page apps.  So you can go live with a web app much faster, and without the fees and approval restrictions.

Questions And Answers

How do I create an iPhone development certificate signing request?

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