Add explainer for launch_handler member

launch_handler-explainer.md

@@ -0,0 +1,141 @@
+# Web App Launch Handling
+
+## Overview
+
+This document describes a new `launch_handler` manifest member that enables
+web apps to customise their launch behaviour across all types of app launch
+triggers.
+
+
+## Use Cases
+
+- Web apps that are designed to be used in a single window e.g. a music app.
+
+- Web app that capture and handle share target events and user navigations
+  in existing windows without invoking a navigation and losing existing state.
+  E.g. sharing an image to a chat web app could open a contact picker overlayed
+  on top of existing chat content.
+
+
+## Background
+
+There are several ways for a web app window to be opened:
+- [File handling](https://github.com/WICG/file-handling/blob/main/explainer.md)
+- [In scope link capturing](https://github.com/WICG/sw-launch/blob/master/declarative_link_capturing.md)
+- [Note taking](https://wicg.github.io/manifest-incubations/index.html#note_taking-member)
+- Platform specific app launch surface
+- [Protocol handling](https://github.com/MicrosoftEdge/MSEdgeExplainers/blob/main/URLProtocolHandler/explainer.md)
+- [Share target](https://w3c.github.io/web-share-target/)
+- [Shortcuts](https://www.w3.org/TR/appmanifest/#dfn-shortcuts)
+
+Web apps launched via these triggers will open in a new or existing app window
+depending on the user agent platform. There is currently no mechanism for the
+web app to configure this behaviour.
+
+
+## Proposal
+
+- Add a `launch_handler` member to the web app manifest specifying the default
+  client selection and navigation behaviour for web app launches.
+  The shape of this member is as follows:
+  ```
+  "launch_handler": {
+    "route_to": "auto" | "new" | "existing",
+    "navigate_client": "auto" | true | false
+  }
+  ```
+
+  If unspecified then `launch_handler` defaults to
+  `{"route_to": "auto", "navigate_client": "auto"}` whereby the behaviour
+  is up to the user agent.
+
+  Both `route_to` and `navigate_client` also accept a list of values, the
+  first valid value will be used.
+
+  Example manifest that choses to receive all app launches as events in existing
+  web app windows:
+  ```json
+  {
+    "name": "Example app",
+    "start_url": "/index.html",
+    "launch_handler": {
+      "route_to": "existing",
+      "navigate_client": false
+    }
+  }
+  ```
+
+- Enqueue a [`LaunchParams`](
+  https://github.com/WICG/file-handling/blob/main/explainer.md#launch)
+  object in the DOM Window's `launchQueue` of the chosen client **for every web
+  app launch**.
+
+- Add a `url` field to `LaunchParams` and set it to the URL being launched if
+  the chosen launch client is not navigated as part of the launch.
+
+  Other web app APIs that involve launching may extend the `LaunchParams` with
+  more data specific to the method of launching e.g. a [share target](
+  https://w3c.github.io/web-share-target/) payload.
+
+
+## Future extensions to this proposal
+
+- Add a service worker `"launch"` event that intercepts every web app launch.
+  The service worker can choose to override the value of `route_to`,
+  `navigate_client` and `LaunchParams`.
+
+  **Use case:** Opening a productivity web app via a
+  [file handler](https://github.com/WICG/file-handling/blob/main/explainer.md)
+  causes an existing window that already had the file open to come into focus
+  instead of launching a duplicate window.
+
+- Add a `new_client_url` member to the web app manifest. All new clients that
+  don't navigate to the launch URL will open `new_client_url` instead.
+
+  If `new_client_url` is the default value `"auto"` then behave as if it is set to
+  the value of `start_url`.
+
+  **Use case:** Web apps that have heavy `start_url` pages and want to avoid
+  loading unnecessary resources.
+
+- Add the `launch_handler` field to other launch methods to allow sites to
+  customise the launch behaviour for specfic launch methods. E.g.:
+  ```json
+  {
+    "name": "Example app",
+    "description": "This app will navigate existing clients unless it was launched via the share target API.",
+    "launch_handler": {
+      "route_to": "existing",
+      "navigate_client": true
+    },
+    "share_target": {
+      "action": "share.html",
+      "params": {
+        "title": "name",
+        "text": "description",
+        "url": "link"
+      },
+      "launch_handler": {
+        "navigate_client": false
+      }
+    }
+  }
+  ```
+
+
+## Related proposals
+
+
+### [Declarative Link Capturing](https://github.com/WICG/sw-launch/blob/main/declarative_link_capturing.md)
+
+`launch_handler` generalises the concept of `capture_links` into two core
+primitive actions (launch client selection and navigation) and more explicitly
+decouples them from the specific "link capturing" launch trigger.
+
+
+### [File Handling](https://github.com/WICG/file-handling/blob/main/explainer.md)
+
+This proposal takes the `LaunchQueue` and `LaunchParams` ideas from the File
+Handling proposal and extends them slightly. Instead of enqueuing `LaunchParams`
+for specific types of launches they will be enqueued for every type of web app
+launch.