Deeplink is not working on Linux/Ubuntu

[vijaygodhasara]

Deeplink is not working on Linux/Ubuntu.

Installed and integrated plugin into our electron project.
open on chrome with :
Open app

getting below error

[glawson]

@vijaygodhasara I'm not sure if electron is even supporting this on Linux - the doc is not very clear. Only mentions Windows and MacOS - https://www.electronjs.org/docs/api/app#appsetasdefaultprotocolclientprotocol-path-args

[glawson]

@vijaygodhasara - it should work on Linux, I'll debug it in the next couple of days.

[vijaygodhasara]

Thanks, Once done let me know so I can check also this stuff on Linux/ubuntu as well.

[glawson]

@vijaygodhasara - sorry it's taken so long. I did find the error and will have a fix out soon (I expect tomorrow).

[cedriking]

@vijaygodhasara - sorry it's taken so long. I did find the error and will have a fix out soon (I expect tomorrow).

Is this now solved? The issue is still marked as open and no replies after this one. Thanks.

[glawson]

@cedriking - unfortunately not. There are some mixed issues regarding app.setAsDefaultProtocolClient on Linux. I tested on Linux and was never able to get it working. I also posted to the electron slack group, never got a response. I'll dig deeper and respond back.

[yeefun]

I try this, and it works.
https://stackoverflow.com/a/66366790

The point is:

    desktop:                            # Define desktop elem
        exec: myapp %u                  # Define Exec

[glawson]

Thanks @yeefun - I'll see if we can incorporate.

[yeefun]

Sorry, I found it doesn't work in every Linux platform.

[glawson]

@yeefun - thanks for letting me know.

[Joelkang]

I think this is where the bug lies:

electron-deeplink/src/index.ts

Lines 145 to 154 in de4690f

	if (os.platform() === 'win32') {
	this.emit('received', argv.slice(-1).join(''));
	}
	if (this.mainWindow) {
	if (this.mainWindow.isMinimized()) {
	this.mainWindow.restore();
	}
	this.mainWindow.focus();
	}

Because open-url and open-file are MacOS only, linux is missing the emit('received') call that windows has. What I wound up having to do to get around this was essentially re-implementing some parts of this library:

if (!gotTheLock) {
  app.quit();
} else {
  const onDeepLink = (link) => {...};
  app.on('second-instance', (_event: Event, args: string[]) => {
    if (['darwin','win32'].includes(process.platform)) return; // This is properly handled by electron-deep-link
    const [_executable, link] = args;
    onDeepLink(link);
  });
  ...
  deepLink = new Deeplink({
    app,
    mainWindow,
    protocol: 'myApp',
  });
  deepLink.on('received', onDeepLink);
}

As a side note, it feels a bit like a leaky abstraction to pass in the MainWindow at all--in particular, I have several windows that I show and hide based on whether the user is logged in (and what deep link is called). So it's not always the case that that the mainWindow should be open on a 2nd instance, or when a deeplink is called. Since callers already receive the received event (this bug not withstanding), they can call within that listener this portion if they wish to focus their main window:

if (this.mainWindow.isMinimized()) { 
    this.mainWindow.restore(); 
} 
this.mainWindow.focus(); 

That said, this is a breaking change, and not really related to this issue, so feel free to ignore.

@glawson happy to throw up a PR to fix this if you'd like!

[glawson]

@Joelkang - that would be awesome!

[yeefun]

#20 (comment)

@Joelkang - I wonder if you test it on Linux and it works?

[Joelkang]

@yeefun yep, I did. In addition to the changes I made above, I had to make this additional change to my Electron Forge config:

 {
      name: '@electron-forge/maker-deb',
      config: {
        options: {
          // existing options ...
          mimeType: ['x-scheme-handler/myApp'], // I added this
        },
      },
    },

[yeefun]

@Joelkang - I also did this, but it didn't work in every Linux platform. (BTW, I use electron-builder.)

what your Desktop Entry looks like?

[Joelkang]

@glawson: Whenever you're ready! (Woops sorry should've checked first before forcepushing so many times.)

@yeefun unfortunately I'm not trying to fix this for all linuxes--as long as it works on ubuntu, i'm good (though it doesn't seem like it shouldn't work on any other flavour).

Here's the desktop file generated from electron-forge:

Name=Dala
Comment=Dala description
GenericName=Dala
Exec=dala %U
Icon=dala
Type=Application
StartupNotify=true
Categories=GNOME;GTK;Utility;
MimeType=x-scheme-handler/dala;

[glawson]

🎉 This issue has been resolved in version 1.0.9 🎉

The release is available on:

• npm package (@latest dist-tag)
• GitHub release

Your semantic-release bot 📦🚀