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Is there an ELI5 explanation of what are Deep links? And in the context of an app, what does a "link" to a place in an app means? "We’re indexing the top apps

Is there an ELI5 explanation of what are Deep links? And in the context of an app, what does a "link" to a place in an app means? "We’re indexing the top apps with deep link tags and building a knowledge graph that organizes apps by their content and by the actions they allow users to take." - whats the advantage for a developer to allow their app to be indexed? I am super intrigued by the tech. But just want to understand by what it can do for an app.

alook 12y ago
CTO of URX here - thanks for the feedback! ELI5 "what is a deep link?": mobile deep links mean registering custom URI schemes for your app, and registering a URL dispatcher within your app. The end result is that users can be sent directly to a specific page of content within your app. For example, spotify:artist:0X2BH1fck6amBIoJhDVmmJ ...will take you to the in-app version of this experience: https://open.spotify.com/artist/0X2BH1fck6amBIoJhDVmmJ The intuition is that sending users to in-app content is preferable to web content; IMHO, this is especially important for apps that have rich content or have logged-in functionality. Example of a bad experience for apps that don't use deeplinks: have you ever clicked on a LinkedIn email on your mobile device and landed on a sign-in page in your mobile browser? If they used deeplinks, you're probably already signed into your LinkedIn app and wouldn't need to go digging for your password. This has been a common pain point in people we've talked to. As a developer, allowing your app to be indexed will make it easier for other developers to send you traffic. Currently, we believe that the limiting factor preventing a "link graph" from existing across apps, is the challenge developers face in discovering how to find (a) which pieces of content are relevant to a page within your app, and (b) how to contruct a deep link URL to send users to those pieces of content.

alook 12y ago

CTO of URX here - thanks for the feedback! ELI5 "what is a deep link?": mobile deep links mean registering custom URI schemes for your app, and registering a URL dispatcher within your app. The end result is that users can be sent directly to a specific page of content within your app. For example, spotify:artist:0X2BH1fck6amBIoJhDVmmJ ...will take you to the in-app version of this experience: https://open.spotify.com/artist/0X2BH1fck6amBIoJhDVmmJ The intuition is that sending users to in-app content is preferable to web content; IMHO, this is especially important for apps that have rich content or have logged-in functionality. Example of a bad experience for apps that don't use deeplinks: have you ever clicked on a LinkedIn email on your mobile device and landed on a sign-in page in your mobile browser? If they used deeplinks, you're probably already signed into your LinkedIn app and wouldn't need to go digging for your password. This has been a common pain point in people we've talked to. As a developer, allowing your app to be indexed will make it easier for other developers to send you traffic. Currently, we believe that the limiting factor preventing a "link graph" from existing across apps, is the challenge developers face in discovering how to find (a) which pieces of content are relevant to a page within your app, and (b) how to contruct a deep link URL to send users to those pieces of content.