add-fdroid-repo "click link"

[goyalyashpal]

adding repo says to

• "click this link".
• i think it was supposed that it'd open with fdroid
• but it doesnt happen, instead the page for Index of /fdroid/repo/ is opened
  

• The only way i can think of to make it work is
  to open it with intent redirector app like Open Link With
• So, how is it supposed to work otherwise? is it intended? or does the wording need to change there?

[goyalyashpal]

so, i have tested on 3-4 devices (running android 10, 11), and the issue seems to be with the app from which the above link is clicked.

The behaviours i'd categorise as 2:

• vv means
  app picker shown, f-droid present there
• xx means
  no app picker shown (and proceeds to the webpage which shows above behav)

Behaviour	App Category	Apps
xx	Browsers	Vivaldi 4.1.2366.26 Chrome 87.0.4280.101
xx	Browser's that isolated tab like thingy	Vivaldi Chrome
vv	Browsers	LAOS Jelly 1.0
vv	Other apps	Telegram 8.2.7 QR Scanner 1.9 Open With 2.5 HTML viewer (via .MD file)

Note:

• LAOS Jelly : i dont remember where did i download this, and it's showing 1.0 on my device,
  but i guess it should correspond to the v7.1.2 in the above linked page. that is to say, the app/version i am using is very old app
• which makes me think that this breakage of behaviour is in the new browser apps

Further tests that can be done:

• Newer browsers on old phones
• old browsers on new phones
• testing in webview

---

So, for my (semi-biased) conclusion:

• i think that google changed browser's behaviour to break the intent parsing/intent interception for external apps/fdroid
• i am saying so, 'cz i have seen google play protect once blocked fdroid, so, fdroid is definitely on google's list
• and this is suuper shady, 'cz the links for play store when clicked from browsers open straight in play store app without even showing the open with/app selector pagelet.

[goyalyashpal]

The comment TeamNewPipe/NewPipe#7436 (comment) sheds some light on an issue which mayyyybe related to this, though i tested with android 10/11....

[goyalyashpal]

@linsui @licaon-kter any comments??

tl;dr: (though please read above input too)
browsers are not redirecting repo links to be handled by open with dialog, and so, fdroid is not shown.....
so, something has to be done there regarding this imo: https://f-droid.org/tutorials/add-repo/

does this seem good enough to open an issue on fdroid's own repo? i'll copy it there if so.

[licaon-kter]

There's an F-Droid issue (in Client iirc) about the way different apps react to a repo link, some open F-Droid...some don't.

I guess you've redone all the investigation.

/LE: issue https://gitlab.com/fdroid/fdroidclient/-/issues/2251