785504 - Implement other ways uninstall Web apps

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(Firefox for Android Graveyard :: Web Apps (PWAs), defect, P1)

Description

[Samat Jain]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Ubuntu; Linux x86_64; rv:16.0) Gecko/20120819 Firefox/16.0
Build ID: 20120819232819

Steps to reproduce:

Wanted to uninstall a Web app. Attempted to:

(1) Remove the icon from my Android home screens.
(2) Go to about:apps and look for any instruction on how to uninstall.


Actual results:

(1) does not uninstall the app; it remains in about:apps.

(2) does not provide _any_ indication on how to uninstall an app. Apparently, what you need to do is long-press an icon and select "Uninstall".


Expected results:

I don't know how to make the UX for (1) better. Perhaps it's fine as-is.

For (2), however, there should be some kind of hint that app icons can be long-pressed for more actions, like Uninstall. In Android 4.0 long-press for additional actions has been deprecated, so Firefox on Android 4.0+ will be inconsistent with way such behaviors work on the OS and other modern apps.

Comment 2

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

I'm moving this up to a P1, cause I've heard this complained about a few times, including yet another occurrence on the apps-feedback alias.

I'm also tacking on tracking-fennec here, cause we probably should at least improve the UX for uninstall through about:apps to quiet the repetitive complains I'm hearing.

Not blocking v1 ship still, however.

Comment 3

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

I don't agree with not tracking-fennec call - we've got more than enough evidence that says that users are unhappy about this. If there's another bug to use to track this that better fits these needs, then flag that bug instead. But leaving behind a a number #1 pain point complained about during a Marketplace Aurora release is unacceptable.

Comment 4

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

Oh and the report is here for the first 5 days of apps feedback.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1wUYcdpV5ydqg9WYViiAsB2GGm6MhynorpMXHnojdTpU/edit#heading=h.c8qzgja8alp7

You'll see very quickly that the uninstall UX was a big pain point.

Comment 5

[Mark Finkle (:mfinkle) (use needinfo?)]

(In reply to Jason Smith [:jsmith] from comment #3)
> I don't agree with not tracking-fennec call - we've got more than enough
> evidence that says that users are unhappy about this. If there's another bug
> to use to track this that better fits these needs, then flag that bug
> instead. But leaving behind a a number #1 pain point complained about during
> a Marketplace Aurora release is unacceptable.

Sounds like you see this bug as "Implement other ways to uninstall webapps". I could agree with tracking that request, but we don't care if the long tap menu is less-than-discoverable. What other ways do we think are possible?

Comment 6

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

(In reply to Mark Finkle (:mfinkle) from comment #5)
> (In reply to Jason Smith [:jsmith] from comment #3)
> > I don't agree with not tracking-fennec call - we've got more than enough
> > evidence that says that users are unhappy about this. If there's another bug
> > to use to track this that better fits these needs, then flag that bug
> > instead. But leaving behind a a number #1 pain point complained about during
> > a Marketplace Aurora release is unacceptable.
> 
> Sounds like you see this bug as "Implement other ways to uninstall webapps".
> I could agree with tracking that request, but we don't care if the long tap
> menu is less-than-discoverable. What other ways do we think are possible?

Okay, fair enough. I think that's a good question to ask to a UX person, along with balancing the technical constraints of Android. Ian - Do you have an opinion here?

Comment 8

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

Ibai - Can you help throw together a doc on this on SUMO?

Comment 9

[:ibai]

I will do this as soon as possible.

Thanks for putting me into the loop.

Comment 10

[:ibai]

Jason, I added the steps to this article:

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-uninstall-app/history

Can you check that the Android steps are correct?

Comment 11

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

(In reply to :ibai from comment #10)
> Jason, I added the steps to this article:
> 
> https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-uninstall-app/history
> 
> Can you check that the Android steps are correct?

Hmm...what's written in that article actually isn't how Android web apps uninstall works. Here's how it works:

1. User via the menu or types about:apps to get app management dashboard
2. User hard presses app
3. User selects "Uninstall"

Result - App is uninstalled. In some cases due to a known bug, the shortcut for the app on the Android homescreen may or may not be removed. If it isn't, the user shall be required to remove the app from the homescreen directly.

I'd probably reference somewhere on that page that the user needs to get the about:apps page through the menu.

Comment 12

[Maria Sandberg [:mushi]]

The user can also long press the app icon on their home screen and then drag the app to the trash can that shows up. Works on the S2 at least...

Comment 13

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

(In reply to Maria Sandberg [:mushi] from comment #12)
> The user can also long press the app icon on their home screen and then drag
> the app to the trash can that shows up. Works on the S2 at least...

Right, but that won't uninstall the web app from the registry. All that will do right now is remove the app from your android homescreen.

Comment 14

[Maureen Hanratty]

Jason, I followed the steps you laid out in your comment but couldn't find my web apps in the app management dashboard. I'm on an HTC One running Android 4.0.3

Comment 15

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

(In reply to Maureen Hanratty from comment #14)
> Jason, I followed the steps you laid out in your comment but couldn't find
> my web apps in the app management dashboard. I'm on an HTC One running
> Android 4.0.3

Did you install a set of apps from marketplace previously? What apps did you install in particular?

Comment 16

[Aaron Train [:aaronmt]]

(In reply to Maureen Hanratty from comment #14)
> Jason, I followed the steps you laid out in your comment but couldn't find
> my web apps in the app management dashboard. I'm on an HTC One running
> Android 4.0.3

(If this is Nightly, you might need to pinch-zoom just a bit in the dashboard - there's a graphics related bug 807299)

Comment 17

[Maureen Hanratty]

Aaron, thanks for pointing out how to uninstall apps from Firefox Aurora! That did indeed work for me.

Jason, not sure if your instructions were for the method that Aaron referenced (where I go into Firefox Aurora options menu, choose "Tools" and then choose "Apps") OR instead you were talking about going into the Android apps dashboard. The apps I downloaded and could not find in Android apps management were: Todoist and Solitaire.

Comment 18

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

(In reply to Maureen Hanratty from comment #17)
> Aaron, thanks for pointing out how to uninstall apps from Firefox Aurora!
> That did indeed work for me.
> 
> Jason, not sure if your instructions were for the method that Aaron
> referenced (where I go into Firefox Aurora options menu, choose "Tools" and
> then choose "Apps") OR instead you were talking about going into the Android
> apps dashboard. The apps I downloaded and could not find in Android apps
> management were: Todoist and Solitaire.

The instructions I was targeting was for what Aaron was describing. The apps won't show up in the Android app manager, because we don't have control over that (only apks end up there).

Comment 20

[Brian Nicholson (:bnicholson)]

Attachment: Sample code for accessing launcher provider

Here's a sample patch for querying the data in launchers. Build available here: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/35559547/fennec-launchers.apk

To use it, click "Check Launchers" in the Fennec menu and monitor your logcat. Running on my phone with 4 launchers installed, here's what I see:

package: com.motorola.blur.home (default Motorola launcher, included with phone)
    is default? true
    found authority: com.android.launcher.settings
        can query!
    found authority: com.motorola.blur.home.apps
    found authority: com.motorola.blur.home.widgets.contacts.favoritesconfigprovider
package: org.adw.launcher (ADW Launcher)
    is default? false
    found authority: org.adw.launcher.settings 
        can query!
    found authority: org.adw.launcher.providers.changelogProvider
package: com.teslacoilsw.launcher (Tesla Launcher)
    is default? false
    found authority: com.teslacoilsw.launcher.settings
        can query!
package: com.gau.go.launcherex (GO Launcher)
    is default? false
    found authority: com.gau.go.launcherex.statistics.provider
    found authority: com.jiubang.ggheart.appgame.base.database.AppGameContentProvider
    found authority: com.jiubang.ggheart.data.model.wirteprovider

The first three launchers all expose a *.launcher.settings provider - these are query-able, and we can read the list of widgets/shortcuts/etc in them. The last launcher, GO Launcher, does not expose such a provider, so we probably can't query it. That's unfortunate since GO Launcher is one of the more popular custom launchers.

Another downside of this approach is that accessing the provider for each launcher requires a separate permission to be defined in AndroidManifest.xml, as shown in the patch. It kind of stinks that we need to explicitly name every launcher we want to be compatible with.

The last caveat I found is that although registering content observers seems to work for adding items to the launcher, the observer isn't notified when items are removed. This means we can't have live updates for about:apps removals unless we poll the launcher while about:apps is open. But we could simply query the launcher every time about:apps is opened, which might not be too bad.

Comment 21

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

I'm actually surprised we haven't tracked this yet.

Comment 22

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

There are simple ways to at least calm the uninstall experience. I still think the choice to use hard presses to discover the uninstall UI choice is definitely not a good idea, as users won't find that unless they do it by accident. A quick and dirty to reduce the damage would to make that UI more discoverable (as in be explicit where the uninstall action can be found). The better long term approach is to find a more natural human understanding approach to uninstall that's possible to do within the constraints of Android.

Personally, I'd at least try to implement the quick and dirty approach at a minimum to reduce some of the damage.

Comment 23

[Mark Finkle (:mfinkle) (use needinfo?)]

Even though we are tracking this, we need more attention from UX to figure out the best user flow before proceeding.

Comment 24

[Maria Sandberg [:mushi]]

(In reply to Mark Finkle (:mfinkle) from comment #23)
> Even though we are tracking this, we need more attention from UX to figure
> out the best user flow before proceeding.

Agree. Vishy is leading the charge on this. From UX Ian Barlow and myself will be involved. There will be little movement on this until after MWC.

Comment 25

[Mark Finkle (:mfinkle) (use needinfo?)]

Update:

We plan on moving ahead with a wrapper APK approach to running webapps on Android. That will provide a better UX overall and should give us new options for tracking uninstall.

The current WIP patch has a few caveats that make it less than ideal, but I wanted Brian to add it anyway. The issues are:
* Need a permission for each launcher to access its provider
* Some launchers provide no provider
* We need to poll the providers

Comment 26

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

(In reply to Mark Finkle (:mfinkle) from comment #25)
> Update:
> 
> We plan on moving ahead with a wrapper APK approach to running webapps on
> Android. That will provide a better UX overall and should give us new
> options for tracking uninstall.

A wrapper APK approach? You mean something like what Soup did?

Comment 27

[Mark Finkle (:mfinkle) (use needinfo?)]

(In reply to Jason Smith [:jsmith] from comment #26)
> (In reply to Mark Finkle (:mfinkle) from comment #25)
> > Update:
> > 
> > We plan on moving ahead with a wrapper APK approach to running webapps on
> > Android. That will provide a better UX overall and should give us new
> > options for tracking uninstall.
> 
> A wrapper APK approach? You mean something like what Soup did?

Yes.

Comment 28

[James Hugman [:jhugman] [@jhugman]]

Touch. 

The uninstall mechanism for synthesized APKs is now the same as ordinary apps.

However, it is unclear to me if this is sufficient to resolve this bug:

 * Android provides multiple ways for the user to uninstall an app, e.g. long press and drag on the apps draw; button in the manage apps settings screen; synth apks work for this.
 * User behaviour (I expect, though have no data) may show that the way most apps get uninstalled is via the app's Play Store listing.

This second point is something we are unable to begin to address until the Firefox Market supports uninstall of the app.

Comment 29

[Myk Melez [:myk] [@mykmelez]]

(In reply to James Hugman [:jhugman] [@jhugman] from comment #28)
> The uninstall mechanism for synthesized APKs is now the same as ordinary
> apps.
> 
> However, it is unclear to me if this is sufficient to resolve this bug:

Indeed, there may be more we should do to let users uninstall apps!  But it'd be better to track that work in new bugs for those specific things.  So let's continue to monitor feedback for signs that users are still having trouble uninstalling apps and file bugs as needed for solutions to any problems that arise.