I'm building an app using Electron. And I really want to recreate what UWP apps can do. UWP apps can get shown on top of the lock screen. How can I achieve that using Electron/NodeJS?
I tried to do this, but it didn't work:
const mainWindow = electron.remote.getCurrentWindow();
if(isWindows10){
try{
lockSystem();
}catch{
//return an error
}
}
mainWindow.restore();
mainWindow.focus();
mainWindow.setKiosk(true);
And if you're wondering about the fact that UWP apps can get rendered on top of the lock screen, yes they indeed can get rendered on top of the lock screen. You can try to take an exam on exam.net on a windows 10 device, and choose the restricted mode. This will result in chrome opening a pop-up window that asks you to run a UWP app that will lock the device and get rendered on top of the lock screen.
https://www.electronjs.org/docs/tutorial/windows-store-guide - This won't help, as the app doesn't gain access to UWP APIs/features.
EDIT: https://github.com/felixrieseberg/electron-uwp-background - Never mind, it is possible to access those features. But I can't figure out how to do it. Any idea?
Issue Context:
I am using meteor js for a mobile app.
I have hooked it up with google analytics calls and basically I am using two type of calls:
Screen views
Events
Screen views are just fine, but I'm facing an issue with the events.
When I go to Behavior -> Events -> Screens, in the google analytics dashboard, I can see the URL of every page that has triggered an event under the Screen Name column. My problem is that the page URLs for my login page look something like this:
meteor.local/login?username=*******&password=+++++++&rememberMe=on
Where ******* is an actual username and +++++++ is the corresponding password!
Reason:
Since I have to share this analytics account with multiple people, I do not want this information to be available over here.
Clues:
CLUE 1:
I used to do GET http calls, but I have changed them all to POST and it still has not fixed the issue as I expected it not to pass plain parameters through URL anymore.
CLUE 2:
I've noticed that the default google analytics js framework is working with http and not https. I was wondering if it is calling the analytics server with a GET as well. If so, is there anyway to change that?
CLUE 3:
Here is how I am initiating the GA instance:
(function (i, s, o, g, r, a, m) {
i['GoogleAnalyticsObject'] = r;
i[r] = i[r] || function () {
(i[r].q = i[r].q || []).push(arguments)
}, i[r].l = 1 * new Date();
a = s.createElement(o),
m = s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];
a.async = 1;
a.src = g;
m.parentNode.insertBefore(a, m)
})(window, document, 'script', '//www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js', 'ga');
ga('create', googleKey, 'auto');
CLUE 4:
I have also noticed that these URLs are getting captured very occasionally. E.g. in the pas 12,500 unique events (about 30,000 total events) it has captured just 9 URLs with the username and password. The remaining 12,491 events have
meteor.local/login
OR
meteor.local/--
OR
localhost/--
as the Screen Name.
CLUE 5:
I have also put 4 "search and replace" global filters on the analytics account to search for this string
meteor.local/.*
and replace it with this one
meteor.local/concealedURI
This does not seem to be working either.
I have added this filter on 4 different fields (Since I still really don't know where the URLs are coming from):
Host Name
Page Title
Referral
Request URI
CLUE 6:
This is how I am calling the GA instance to send the event:
ga('send', 'event', 'button', 'click', eventName);
Okay. So, I had to run a lot of experiments and try out different things to solve this issue.
After trying all the things that I have described in the question, I finally found a way to address this problem.
The main cause of this problem was that I was using a google analytics account set to track an App, to capture the data from an app that was built with meteor js (which basically utilizes cordova).
Using meteor means that my app's screens are actually web pages rendered as a mobile app. It seems like meteor uses URLs to navigate through these screens.
On the other hand, google analytics looks at (and captures) the screen name of an app's page, when an event is triggered from that page. In native apps this screen name will be something similar to "About us", "Contact Us", "Home", etc.
Now since a meteor app is not the same, the screen name returned by meteor is actually the URL of the page that has triggered the event.
This does not have anything to do with the http calls (Whether or not they are GET or POST), because it is the local URL used by meteor for navigating that is being passed down to google analytics and not any http calls.
Solutions
1.
If I had the google analytics account set as a web page tracker, I could have access to "Exclude URL Query Parameters" field and I could potentially exclude username and password as was suggested by #Mike and #PhilipPryde in the comments.
However, I needed to use google analytics set as an app tracker. So, this did not work for me.
Failed
2.
I did put a filter on the whole view in the google analytics and searched for meteor.local/.* and replaced that with hiddenURL. The filters on
Host Name
Page Title
Referral
Request URI
did not work.
But when I put the same filter on
Screen Label
field, it worked.
However, this only looked at the screen names returned by screen view hits and not the event. Thus, this did not actually solve my issue either.
Failed
Finally, I had to do this:
There is a method call on GA instance that lets you set different options up. I ended up using this:
ga('set', 'screenName', 'hiddenURL');
This changed the screen name to "hiddenURL". So, I used this before every event and it worked for me.
My code for sending events to google analytics looked like this:
ga('set', 'screenName', 'hiddenURL');
ga('send', 'event', 'button', 'click', eventName);
PS:
This changes the screen name that was showing up in real-time reports of google analytics to "hiddenURL", whenever someone triggered an event. But, it changes back to a screen name as soon as they go to another page. So, it would not also mess with any of your screen view data either, since it is not being captured as a screen view.
Of course that is because, I pass the screen name to my GA instance every time I send a screen view. So it looks like this:
sendScreenViewToGA = function (screenName) {
ga('send', 'screenview', {
'appName': 'Something',
'screenName': screenName,
'appVersion': x.x
});
}
If I had used the screen name, that is being set on the environment tight now, I would have ended up with all my screen names in analytics set to "hiddenURL".
I really hope this post will help others with same issues and save them some time.
I am a 'Chrome for Business and Education' admin for a fleet of chromebooks which I have configured to run in Single App Kiosk mode. The kiosk app in question is really simple. All I did was take the example code from this page that uses the 'webview tag' (without controls, as we need all the whole screen for the app in question) and change the URL. The app has installed perfectly in all managed devices.
The problem now is that there are times when we want to be able to exit the kiosk app and return to the chromebook login screen. Right now the only way of doing this is to shut the machine down, start it and exit from the kiosk app boot screen by pressing Ctrl+Alt+S. The whole process takes 30 seconds plus per machine (the fleet contains 50). So we really need to be able to just quit out of the kiosk app and go back to the login screen (which would take about 5 seconds or less).
Now, I could just add a quit button to the screen (as per the second example app with navigation controls from the page referenced above) but this means we lose screen space for the app. The preferred solution is to close the app with keystrokes (e.g. Ctrl+Shift+L). But how do you do this in this context? I have tried adding conventional onkeydown javascript to the page containing the webview tag and this seems to be ignored. I have also tried using the 'chrome commands API', and whilst I can see that the shortcut had been registered against the extension (by clicking 'Keyboard shortcuts' on the chrome://extensions tab) it has no effect. The kiosk app window remains stubbornly open.
Does anyone know if this is possible and if so how?
Cheers,
Miles
In your manifest.json file add this entry to create the command for the app.
"commands": {
"exit-app": {
"suggested_key": {
"default": "Ctrl+Shift+L"
},
"description": "Exit the app"
}
}
Then you need to add code to your background script file to listen for the command. This code will close all windows in the app when it receives the exit-app command you created in the manifest.
chrome.commands.onCommand.addListener(function(command) {
switch(command) {
case 'exit-app':
exitApp();
break;
}
});
function exitApp() {
chrome.app.window.getAll().forEach(function(win) {
win.close();
});
}
Note that the key combination is only suggested, and might be ignored if another app or Chrome keyboard shortcut already uses that combination. You do still need to go to the Keyboard shortcuts link on the chrome://extensions page and verify that the key combination has actually been set for your app.
I have developed a windows phone 8 application. Now I want to display vserv ads to my application.
I have added the sdk to my application and also applied code to show ads:
public MainPage()
{
InitializeComponent();
VservAdControl VMB = VservAdControl.Instance;
VMB.DisplayAd(zoneID, LayoutRoot);
VMB.VservAdClosed += new EventHandler(VACCallback_OnVservAdClosing);
VMB.VservAdNoFill += new EventHandler(VACCallback_OnVservAdNoFill);
}
void VACCallback_OnVservAdClosing(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
MessageBox.Show("Ad close by user.");
}
void VACCallback_OnVservAdNoFill(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
if (adGrid != null)
adGrid.Visibility = Visibility.Collapsed;
}
But after closing the ad the application page goes blank, all content, application bar automatically goes blank. After using back arrow that quits my application, i try to relaunch my application but application stuck at the splash screen on the emulator.
Wrap ad control inside a grid. Ad control could have manipulated the grid
I encountered the same issue and they have updated their SDK several times. If you provide the stacktrace they will provide you a fix.
Apart from what you have seen, there are other issues with the SDK. I integrated it few weeks back. So issues could have been resolved after that.
Memory leak. Click the ad or navigate back and forth - you will see the memory ever growing. This is because of events not being detached (withing SDK). I was consistently able to see my app crash in 512 MB emulator when banner ad is loaded (after 4 - 5 times). They could have used weak listeners. You might need to tweak a lot to overcome this issue (In multi page app)
RequestAdCallback throws null pointer exception sometimes crashing
the app. When people use app, they will navigate fast - forcing the
webbrowser to unload. All callbacks should be null pointer exception
free. Make sure that you handle unhandled exception globally otherwise app will not pass certification
It reads WMAppManifest.xml as text not as XML. So I had App element commented in first line before the actual one. It picked title from commented XML element
Application bar is manipulated in many events in the SDK. So you have to make sure that app bar is built dynamically. Test all navigation paths.
SDK assumes user will click the left arrow button which fires ad closing event. Try pressing phone back button instead. The app bar still disappears
SDK documentation requests app to demand ID_CAP_REMOVABLE_STORAGE capability. I don't see a reason to request this capability but I didn't add this
I have emailed them all these details. May be their latest SDK could have resolved these issues. But please do thorough testing after integration.
Add a function to load applicationbar using code
private void BuildLocalizedApplicationBar()
{
// Set the page's ApplicationBar to a new instance of ApplicationBar.
ApplicationBar = new ApplicationBar();
ApplicationBar.Mode = ApplicationBarMode.Default;
ApplicationBar.Opacity = 1.0;
ApplicationBar.IsVisible = true;
ApplicationBar.IsMenuEnabled = false;
// Create a new button and set the text value to the localized string from AppResources.
ApplicationBarIconButton button1 = new ApplicationBarIconButton();
button1.IconUri = new Uri("/Images/sms.png", UriKind.Relative);
button1.Text = "sms";
ApplicationBar.Buttons.Add(button1);
}
and then in VACCallback_OnVservAdClosing event handler call the function
BuildLocalizedApplicationBar()
Please check the following link,
where to add application id and adUnitiD while integrating vserv ads sdk to windows phone 8 application, which is related to your question.
I am creating an iPhone app in which I am providing a call feature with the help of which a user can call place a call on a specified number. I am able achieve the above feature via open URL.
Now after completion of the call I want to resume the execution of app automatically. Although a user can make a fast app switch in iOS 4.0. but I want this to be done automatically.
I have seen the same behavior in "TomTom" app but I am not sure how this app has achieved it.
Thanks
Sandy
Apple does not allow you to resume an app after a phone call. What you can however try doing is using a local notification.
After calling the 'call' url handler you will need to start a background task and monitor for a call state change:
CTCallCenter *c=[[CTCallCenter alloc] init];
c.callEventHandler=^(CTCall* call){
if(call.callState == CTCallStateDisconnected) {
// do stuff here
}
}
When you get a call state change, create a local notification to alert the user to resume the app. If the user taps on "view" your application will then come to the foreground. Obviously if the call is longer than 10 minutes this won't work as Apple only allows 10 minutes to background tasks.