Support for other protocols in Android webview

Question

I\'ve created a web view app, the page that is displayed features market:// links but upon clicking them I get the 404 screen along with the error that the protocol is not s

Answer 1

It is important to understand how the webview and its clients (webviewclient and webchromeclient) works. Please go through the http://therockncoder.blogspot.in/2014/04/understanding-androids-webchromeclient.html

In the webviewclient's shouldOverrideUrlLoading() method, you can decide if you want to open the link in new browser or within the webview. If you don't override this method, it will by default open the link in a new browser outside of the your android application. If you want to open within webview, override the method as below

public boolean shouldOverrideUrlLoading(WebView view, String url) { 

    Log.v("activity", "INSIDE WEBVIEW CLIENT ON shouldOverrideUrlLoading");
        view.loadUrl(url);
        return false; //need to understand return value based on usage
    }

Schemes like whatsapp://send?text=Hello%20World! or market://details?id=xx.xx.xx will open the corresponding apps automatically if they are opened outside the webview and if that app is installed on the handset.

If you want to open certain links within webview and specific schemes outside webview, you need to override WebChromeClients onCreateWindow() method as explained in the link provided above. It should solve the purpose.