Apple is not fond of URL scheme and wants developers to work on the Universal Links as it promotes user-privacy.
Latest Apple news is regarding the tech giant luring the developers away from URL scheme and its temptations which had been used by Twitter last year so it could be tracked what apps were installed on the users’ iOS devices. In order for this to happen, the company has unveiled a substitute in Universal Links. This alternative approach directs the users exactly to the relevant content within the users’ app, by using the web preceded links which are the standard, for example http:// or https://.
Apple news reports that the approach that has been proposed has couple of advantages. One of the first ones to mention is that this approach avoids the issues pertaining to privacy. It is because the usage of custom schemes does not inform the originating app regarding the fact if the user has the destination app in their phone or not. This also points out that the link opens in app which is correct, that is not true when it comes to URL schemes because that can be adopted by any app and can result in the conflicts between the apps if being selected for more than one app.
The Universal links provide the ability for the path of solid feature which does not result in not letting the users know if the app is not installed. Instead, the URL redirects the users to the companion website that shall be present for the particular app in Safari, either to the destination page for the installation of that app, if created by the developer or to the content that was being searched for.
Universal Link and the features that are related use http or https standard web links and also let the developers keep track of how much site section can be searched in the app and what should be done when the content being searched for is not in the app yet however can be found on the site.
Such Universal Links being set up that route the users successfully who click on the URLs to developer’s app expect some work to be done from the developer’s side as well. This includes the special json file that shall be created by the developer and will be residing on the developer’s website server. Through iOS 9, Apple has aimed to make this process easier. This has happened by removing the specification that the json file must be signed via SSL certificate from providers that are outside. There are other benefits to the Universal Links but the end-users are most likely to appreciate this change a lot.
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