1

Does anyone know how to serve the phonegap/cordova app www folder remotely?

So i'm developing this camera app using the sencha touch framework with a layer of cordova to gain access to devices native camera.

Im trying to serve the www folder remotely to be able to push updates to users without having to update the app.

So i have tried to just copy the www folder from the android platform to the remote server. This worked on android but all other devices failed to load the website. Is the www folder specific to the device?

When i test on ios i get a JS alert displaying "gap_init:2"

EDIT: As it turns out, android was caching the old website. Now i'm down to nothing working.

Any help would be appriciated.

Mkni1408
  • 125
  • 1
  • 2
  • 9
  • I am pretty sure this will never ever happen in Apple Store. Never ever. You could do so, but you would have to load a javascript file and inject it on the fly. This might work for code snippets, but not for full sized apps. – Dinkheller Oct 02 '14 at 09:29
  • Yeah, i know about the app store problem. But we are on the enterprise program so we wont have to get our app through the validation process. If you have some pointers to how it could be achieved i would appreciate it. – Mkni1408 Oct 02 '14 at 09:51
  • simply use an iframe and add your sencha app there. But where is the point of not making it a WebApp at that point. You can simply build it with sencha app build production and get a webapp which has a desktop-icon .... and your full control – Dinkheller Oct 02 '14 at 13:32
  • What you are asking for is essentially Sencha Space: http://www.sencha.com/products/space/ – arthurakay Oct 02 '14 at 14:35

3 Answers3

1

This was my grand question and I've spent ~3 days searching for answer.

My situation was similar: I have hybrid Cordova app with android plugins and I need to load all the web app scripts/content from remote server and at the same time I need to have access to plugins and native features.

In my case, I have to platforms: Android and Desktop PC to be able to access the same web app.

For Android platform, you have to copy all the files (cordova.js, cordova_plugins.js plugins*) from "platforms\android\assets\www\" to your server's web app root folder. You have to put them info platform specific folder on server (e.g. "js-android"). For me this step was a major show-stopper for native plugins to get working.

Somewhere in Cordova docs it is told that during prepare/build time different cordova.js is generated for every platform. Thant means, you have to implement extra function to detect platform and load correct cordova.js from server side.

In your web app you have to include only cordova.js (no need to include something regarding plugins to work).

ramns
  • 49
  • 5
0

This can be done by simply loading the remote site using 

window.document.location = http://yoursite.com

from the Phonegap app

There are a few more steps required to allow the Phonegap API functions to work from your remote app.

  1. Build your remote app using Sencha CMD
  2. Deploy the build files on your server.
  3. Copy the cordova.js file for the proper platform iOS, Android etc. to your remote server deployment folder.
  4. If your using Cordova 3.0 or higher you will also need to copy any plugin JavaScript files to your remote server
  5. Add a script link in your remote app index.html file for cordova.js. The script link should occur before the Sencha microloader code.

When this is configured properly. Your Phonegap app will load the remote web app, run the cordova.js script then launch the Sencha app code. You will have access to the Phonegap device API from your remote app code.

I have used this approach with Sencha Touch 2.3.1 and Phonegap 3.5

You can also configure the appcache to allow your remotely served app to be available 'offline'

Jeff Martin
  • 550
  • 4
  • 12
  • You just saved my day. I was really going nuts trying to figure this out!! The problem was that i failed to realize that the generated cordova js files + plugins were platform specific. Now it works, thanks!! – Mkni1408 Oct 03 '14 at 12:15
0

It is trying to check the onDeviceReady event for window.cordova, which is why the error is popping up in the browser.

shonjs
  • 256
  • 1
  • 6