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An important detail that you might miss without reading the article is that these capabilities are not available to any website a user visits. The user must add

• arendtio 4y ago
  Does this affect Firefox on iOS too? Just yesterday I tried to add a website to my home screen but couldn't find the button.
• duxup 4y ago
  Yeah absolutely this has to be a limitation. I do not want to have to go chasing “where did this annoying notification come from” game… ever.
  • wartijn_ 4y ago
    Desktop browsers don't have this limitation and I never have to play that game. It's just a stetting where you can choose to allow websites to ask for notification permission, or block it from every website.
    • yamtaddle 4y ago
      Check in with the average user of desktop browsers. You may find a lot of them have accidentally accepted web pushes and have no idea how to make them go away. I'd be shocked if the vast majority of "use" of the "feature" weren't exactly that kind of spammy, unwanted messaging.
      • KyeRussell 4y ago
        It’s certainly the majority of times I’ve been prompted to enable it for a website.
    • dmonitor 4y ago
      it’s constantly abused by spam trying to masquerade as the browser because the prompt extends below the line of death
    • waboremo 4y ago
      Part of the problem for desktop browsers (except for power users) is that they've never opened the settings option, not once. They might have opened Mac's system preferences or Windows Settings app but other than that they have no idea they can toggle a plethora of options for their browser.
      • kube-system 4y ago
        Exactly, which is why things like this used to happen: https://i.stack.imgur.com/82hWm.jpg https://i.stack.imgur.com/82hWm.jpg
      • duxup 4y ago
        For you and me no problems. Other people I think it is an issue.
    • deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    • interpol_p 4y ago
      I dislike the desktop implementation of push permission request in macOS Safari It presents a modal popup asking for permission. A few times I have accidentally clicked "Allow" only to have to hunt through my notification settings for the offending website to remove it Web sites should not be allowed to present modal, native UI that can interrupt the browser. They should be contained to their window A better implementation would be to allow the browser to show a bell or other icon in the main UI indicating the website offers push notifications. Clicking on that would inform and allow the user to opt-in
    • barnabee 4y ago
      My desktop browsers get denied permission to show notifications at the OS level and are set to block them for all sites without asking. I can't think of a single valid use case for them. There are only a handful of desktop apps (literally 4 or 5 apps like MeetingBar) that I allow to use notifications on desktop. For essential messaging app, etc. that I need notifications on, I configure them to be only on my phone, which I can just turn over if I don't want to see them. This new iOS functionality therefore fits perfectly with how I use notifications: if I install the website like a mobile app, it can maybe get notifications, otherwise websites can't bother me even with requests to show them.
• yamtaddle 4y ago
  Oh thank god. I was worried it'd let sites ask without the user first taking some action to permit it. Sites being able to pop "allow notifications?" without the user first indicating they might want that, on desktop, is a menace.
• nvrspyx 4y ago
  Now if only they'd create a separate folder for web apps in the App Library to put them in instead of requiring that they be on the Home Screen.
  • alwillis 4y ago
    > Now if only they'd create a separate folder for web apps in the App Library to put them in instead of requiring that they be on the Home Screen. Could be a feature of iOS 17, which will be available to developers at WWDC in June.
    • KyeRussell 4y ago
      Yes, like it is every year. Shovelware blog tier speculation.
    • nvrspyx 4y ago
      It could, but I won't hold my breath. I've fallen into the trap of being optimistic that some annoyance will be fixed or some obvious improvement will be implemented in iOS <next_version> multiple times and ending up disappointed. I'm even less hopeful of anything that would improve PWAs, whether in terms of API support or user experience, due to Apple's incentive to keep them second-class.
  • Someone 4y ago
    You can get close: put them in a folder on your Home Screen. Disadvantages: - cannot hide that folder in the App Library - limited number of shortcuts per folder
    • extra88 4y ago
      I don't think there is a limit to how many apps icons can be in an iOS folder, they're paginated. Right now, I have 27 in an "Apple" folder, spread over 3 pages. If I add another icon, it adds another page.
  • thekingshorses 4y ago
    And reinstall it like native apps on factory reset or transfer like native apps to a new device.
• hbn 4y ago
  Good. Web push is such a mess. The amount of people with Android phones like my grandma that accepted push notifications on some spam site, either by accident or because users are so conditioned to just click "ok" to make popups go away, it's absurd.
  • maicro 4y ago
    FYI, you can disable the ability for Chromium-based browsers to even ask the user if they want to allow notifications - on my Android phone in Chrome, it's under Settings, Site settings. There you can set "Notifications" to "Blocked" (and if you're paranoid like me, turn most others off as well).
    • starik36 4y ago
      I doubt his grandma would find this option.
      • maicro 4y ago
        Absolutely fair, but that's why I set that on all browsers I configure for family, and recently had to walk my sister through on her phone when she accidentally allowed notifications from some website that started spamming her with various scam attempts.
    • zakki 4y ago
      I don’t know if they’ll accept this solution. The other camp just want: “It works automatically like magic”. I just want to point out that we have to be familiar with the tools we used.
    • babypuncher 4y ago
      You can do this in Firefox as well. However, nagging the shit out of users should not be the default behavior. They knew that this feature would get abused by every sleazy webmaster on the planet as soon as it was supported in popular browsers. The feature should have been properly designed in the first place. Now I'm content with letting it die. I appreciate Apple's willingness to more or less ignore open standards that hurt the user experience more than they benefit it.
• spandrew 4y ago
  Ya. It's safe to assume if someone is opting to add a website to their homescreen they are interested in it; notifications may make sense. Random websites asking me to enable desktop notifications are annoying. This prevents that for mobile.
• mrtksn 4y ago
  Very sensible limitation, otherwise we would just have another dialog to deny or accept on every website.
• taude 4y ago
  I'd have expected no less, since Chrome already protects the notification noise by default, too. You have to opt in to notifications. Sounds like a slightly different implementation for iOS, which is interesting in that they're assuming any app you add to Home Screen means your opting in to the notifications, or is there another opt-in? I see myself putting a few apps on my home screen that I want to click on often, but maybe not wanting the notifications to go with it?
  • bakje 4y ago
    I believe adding a site to your home screen isn't opting in to notifications, but opting in to allowing the site to request notifications, which would then require another opt-in.
  • mbreese 4y ago
    > Chrome already protects the notification noise by default Does it though? I still get asked to opt-in for notifications on websites regularly, including those I've already said no to. A simple opt-in question still makes me answer the question routinely (with the default "Sites can ask to send notifications" setting). This puts a much higher bar on the notification opt-in game.
    • taude 4y ago
      I get asked, but once I say no, I haven't gotten prompted again. And if you accidentally click yes, it even has a section in the 'safety check' section that will have a list of sites sending you too many notifications. Also, there's another setting where you can toggle between: ask permission, block all; and some other silent blocking them.... I wonder if it remembers my settings better because I have a google account that my chrome is logged into for syncing these things?
  • barkerja 4y ago
    A web app that has been added to the Home Screen can request permission to receive push notifications as long as that request is in response to direct user interaction -- such as tapping on a ‘subscribe’ button provided by the web app. iOS or iPadOS will prompt the user to give the web app permission to send notifications. The user can then manage those permissions per web app in Notifications Settings -- just like any other app on iPhone and iPad.
• pier25 4y ago
  It's a good restriction although I wish Apple helped a bit with the installation of web apps to the home screen. Not install prompt banners like in Android* but right now you have to use the Share screen. It almost feels like Apple is hiding that functionality so that users don't find it. Installing and sharing are two very different actions. * I'm an android user and I agree these are bad.
  • throwanem 4y ago
    "Share sheet" is a bit historical in my opinion, and has been for some time. In practice it serves as more of an OS-level context menu that happens to put the "send to frequent contacts" and "open in another app" options first. In theory Safari's tab context menu would be a better fit, but given it iconifies as a "change text size" tool, I don't know if that would really address your concern at all.
  • Gigachad 4y ago
    For people who haven't used iOS, the Share screen is the ios junk draw where every option they couldn't find a better place to put something goes. Things like Find on page are located there too.
    • tomduncalf 4y ago
      FYI you can just type in the address bar and a “find in page” option appears in the autocomplete list if that text is on the page, no need to use the share screen
      • gregoriol 4y ago
        This is even more hidden than the one in the share screen
        • sosborn 4y ago
          More hidden maybe, but definitely more logical.
• cyanydeez 4y ago
  The web has a standard we push API.
• babypuncher 4y ago
  I agree. None of this stuff should even be requested before the user makes it clear they are actually interested. I like that I didn't have to permanently disable push notifications in Safari to stop those awful popups asking if I wanted them. Apple knows that people will say "no" 99.9% of the time. It makes more sense to make the user jump through hoops the one time they actually want it than to incessantly nag them every single time they make the mistake of visiting a new web page.
• camhart 4y ago
  This seems very unintuitive though. Why not just add a button somewhere that says "enable notifications"? Apple loves these super unintuitive approaches. Blows my mind that anyone actually believes the marketing that they're "easier to use" than any other platform.
  • fiddlerwoaroof 4y ago
    I think that’s this is because the “add to Home Screen” workflow is how you install PWAs on iOS and they want to restrict these APIs to PWAs.
• PossiblyKyle 4y ago
  My mother has an Android phone, and she’s not really tech savvy. Her notifications are absolutely bombarded with garbage from various websites, and her lock screen displays ads. I’m moving her to iOS, as I’m quite sick of constantly being the IT guy.
  • philliphaydon 4y ago
    Oh I can relate to this. Bought my mum an android phone when my daughter was born so I could share photos and do video calls. It was such a hassle doing support over the phone (She lives in NZ and I was in Singapore, and now Taiwan) Bought her an iPhone 12. Apple support helped her set it up over the phone. 2 years and I haven’t played IT guy once!
• achairapart 4y ago
  I guess websites will start asking users to add them "to the home screen", so they can later start asking permissions for push notifications... But this is a different kind of problem and no reason to slow down the Push API standard. I'm very happy that they also finally implemented things like Screen Wake Lock API so developers will no longer be forced to do silly things like play a fake video loop in the background to keep the app in focus. Looks like Apple is finally going to give PWAs some love and it's a good thing overall.
  • bioemerl 4y ago
    It's actually pretty difficult to do something like that since an install is done through the OS and the app can't set off the process. I think it's too clumsy for most sites to try it. Chrome does let you do it though.