As presented in DroidCon Tel Aviv 2015 http://il.droidcon.com

1. DroidCon
Deep Linking 101
June 2015
Naor Rosenberg – Manager, Developer Network Engineering Team

2. DroidCon
Agenda
• What are deep links?
• Why are deep links useful for developers? For users?
• How do I implement deep linking?

3. DroidCon
What: Web Deep Linking
http://example.com/over/there?param=value
scheme domain path query

4. DroidCon
What: Mobile Deep Linking

5. DroidCon
What: Mobile Deep Linking

6. DroidCon
airbnb://rooms/5259603
etsy://listing/190881511
ebay://link/?nav=item.view&id=161640221974&referrer=ebay.com&min_version=17
android-­‐app://com.airbnb.android/airbnb/rooms/5259603
and
even:
http://sub.domain.com/path?param=value
Deep Links – Real World Examples
http://example.com/over/there?param=value
scheme domain path query

7. DroidCon
What: Mobile Deep Linking

8. DroidCon
Agenda
• What are deep links?
• Why are deep links useful for developers? For users?
• How do I implement deep linking?

9. DroidCon
Why: Growth & Engagement
• How many apps are downloaded per month?

10. DroidCon
Why: Growth

11. DroidCon
Why: Growth

12. DroidCon
Example: Need a Ride Home?

13. DroidCon
taxi

14. DroidCon
Why: Growth & Engagement
Evolving Search for the Mobile Era

15. DroidCon
THE BIG GUYS ARE ALREADY THERE

16. DroidCon
"Deep links to your app appear
in Google Search results on
Android so users can get to your
native mobile experience quickly
and easily."
Source: Google Developer's Website
Why: Growth & Engagement

17. DroidCon
Why: Engagement & Growth
Apple,
June
8th
2015

18. DroidCon
Microso7
Bing,
May
21st
2015

19. DroidCon
Growth & Monetization:
Cross-promotion of app functions will create the
highway of the future mobile ecosystem

20. DroidCon
Solution: Connect a Grid System of Apps
*Source: Happy family iz happy by Frédéric de Villamil / CC BY-SA 2.0

21. DroidCon
Creating a Seamless Experience

22. DroidCon
Agenda
• What are deep links?
• Why are deep links useful for developers? For users?
• How do I implement deep linking?

23. DroidCon
How: Strategies
Defining
• Manifest.xml: add
intent-filter
• Handle intents in
the Activity
Publishing
• Web to Native
Mappings
• Stand-alone Native

24. DroidCon
How: Defining Deep Links
• Android
• Define intent filters in the app manifest
• Should have at least one intent filter per deeplinkable activity
• The intent filter should have a data tag with at least the android:scheme
attribute set
• Handling the intent in the activity

25. DroidCon
Example: Defining Deep Links – Intent Filters
<!-­‐-­‐
airbnb://rooms/5259603
-­‐-­‐>
<activity
android:name="com.airbnb.ShowRoom”>
<intent-­‐filter>
<action
android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW"
/>
<category
android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT"
/>
<category
android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE"
/>
<data
android:scheme="airbnb"
android:host="rooms"
/>
</intent-­‐filter>
</activity>

26. DroidCon
Example: Defining Deep Links – Handling the Intent
@Override
public
void
onCreate(Bundle
savedInstanceState)
{
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.main);
Intent
intent
=
getIntent();
Uri
data
=
intent.getData();
String
path
=
data.getPath();
}

27. DroidCon
Publishing – Do you have a website?
<!–-­‐
Google
App
Indexing
-­‐-­‐>
<link
href="android-­‐app://com.yelp.android/yelp-­‐app-­‐indexing/biz/
PbwkBPAyw"/>
<!–-­‐
Facebook’s
AppLink
-­‐-­‐>
<meta
property="al:android:url"
content="etsy://listing/190881511"/>
<!–-­‐
Twitter’s
Card
-­‐-­‐>
<meta
name="twitter:app:url:googleplay"
value="etsy://listing/19881511"/>
<!–-­‐
AppURL
-­‐-­‐>
<link
type="x-­‐edition/android-­‐newest"
href="http://example.com/123"/>

28. DroidCon
Example: Publishing – Web to Native – Google App Indexing
<link
href="android-­‐app://com.yelp.android/yelp-­‐app-­‐indexing/biz/
PbwkBPpiXqKQR7fPJvGAyw?
utm_campaign=biz_details&amp;utm_medium=organic&amp;utm_source=google"
rel="alternate"
/>
<link
href="ios-­‐app://284910350/yelp/biz/PbwkBPpiXqKQR7fPJvGAyw?
utm_campaign=biz_details&amp;utm_medium=organic&amp;utm_source=google"
rel="alternate"
/>

29. DroidCon
Example: Publishing – Web to Native Sitemap –
Google App Indexing
<?xml
version="1.0"
encoding="UTF-­‐8"
?>
<urlset
xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9"
xmlns:xhtml="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<url>
<loc>http://grid6.us/example1</loc>
<xhtml:link
rel="alternate"
href="android-­‐app://us.grid6/http/
grid6.us/example1"
/>
</url>
</urlset>

30. DroidCon
Publishing – only have an app?
• Publish Directly to Google using GoogleApiClient, from the Activity,
during client run-time.
GoogleApiClient
mClient
=
new
GoogleApiClient.Builder(this).
addApi(AppIndex.APP_INDEX_API).build();
//
inside
onCreate
AppIndex.AppIndexApi.view(mClient,
<page
data>);
//
inside
onStart

31. DroidCon
Mobile Deep Linking
• Powerful for users
• Can help drive growth, engagement and monetization
• Easy to implement

32. DroidCon
Thank You!
naor@quixey.com
https://www.linkedin.com/in/naorrosenberg