Detect if browser has RSS/News Aggregator installed

[WolfShade]

Hello, all,

I was wondering if it's possible to use JavaScript to detect if a user's browser has an RSS Feed Reader or News Aggregator extension installed?

I'm tasked with adding an RSS Feed subscription to a project, and I noticed that if a browser does not have a Feed Reader or News Aggregator then clicking the link just displays the code contained within my .rss file.  So, I would like to use a conditional whereby if a Feed Reader isn't installed, the RSS subscribe link doesn't show.

Any thoughts?

V/r,

^ _ ^

[pziecina]

There is an api that will detect native installed apps, if I remember correctly look for info on the js function -

getInstalledRelatedApps()

You will have to check on browser support, but I dont think IE has support

It will obviously not work on mobile devices, so you will have to ask the user to open in an installed app, but I think something changed in iOS 10 and a method to transfer to the app was I think introduced, (not certain, sorry).

[WolfShade]

Thank you for the suggestion, pziecina.  I'll Google it and see what comes up.

V/r,

^ _ ^

[pziecina]

Just a thought, but have you checked if the feeds you wish to use support streamed data?

The reason I ask is because including streamed data into a web page, would not require an 3rd party app or extension, (though it would require iOS11).

[WolfShade]

The RSS is for our News page, and will not contain any streamed media.

I looked at your suggestion for getInstalledRelatedApps, and that has very little support, and is more for if you have both a web page and an application so that if a notification gets sent out it doesn't appear in both for the user.  It has to be attached to the application (which we do not have one.)

V/r,

^ _ ^

[pziecina]

By streamed data, I was refering to streams via web sockets.

[WolfShade]

The following code will read the plugins of a browser and display what plugins there are:

<div id="pluginDisplay"></div>
<script type="text/javascript">
    var x = navigator.plugins, y = x.length, z = "Plugins: <br />";
    for(j = 0; j < y; j++){
          z += navigator.plugins.name + "<br />";
          }
    document.getElementById('pluginDisplay').innerHTML = z;
</script>

If there is a way to do the same for extensions, that is what I am trying to find.  Is anyone aware of a way to do this?

V/r,

^ _ ^