Web Intents was an experimental framework for web-based inter-application communication and service discovery. Web Intents consists of a discovery mechanism and a very light-weight

RPC RPC may refer to: Science and technology * Rational polynomial coefficient * Reactive Plastic Curtain, a carbon-dioxide-absorbing device used in some rebreather breathing sets * Regional Playback Control, a regional lockout technology for DVDs ...

system between web applications, modelled after the Intents system in Android. In the context of the framework an Intent equals an action to be performed by a provider. Web Intents allow two web applications to communicate with each other, without either of them having to actually know what the other one is.TechCrunch: Google Announces Plans To Bake Android-Like Web Intents Into Chrome
/ref>

Support

Client

Google Chrome Google Chrome is a web browser developed by Google. It was first released in 2008 for Microsoft Windows, built with free software components from Apple WebKit and Mozilla Firefox. Versions were later released for Linux, macOS, iOS, iPadOS, an ...

versions 18 to 23 natively supported Web Intents. This support was disabled in version 24, citing the existence of a "number of areas for development in both the API and specific user experience in Chrome".Status of web intents in Chrome
/ref> * There is a JavaScript shim with support for IE 8, IE 9,

Opera Opera is a form of History of theatre#European theatre, Western theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by Singing, singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically ...

Safari A safari (; originally ) is an overland journey to observe wildlife, wild animals, especially in East Africa. The so-called big five game, "Big Five" game animals of Africa – lion, African leopard, leopard, rhinoceros, African elephant, elep ...

Firefox Mozilla Firefox, or simply Firefox, is a free and open-source web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation. It uses the Gecko rendering engine to display web pages, which implements curr ...

3+ and Chrome 3+.Web Intents FAQ
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Server

* There are some Web Intents proxy pages that make available some real services that don't yet support intents. *

AddThis AddThis was a free social bookmarking service that could be integrated into a website with the use of a web widget. Once the widget was added, visitors of a website using the service could bookmark or share an item using a variety of services, ...

supports Web Intents by their sharing tools regardless of browser support.AddThis blog: A Step for Open Sharing: AddThis Integrates Web Intents
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History

Paul Kinlan of

Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...

announced the Web Intents project in December 2010. He soon released a prototype

API An application programming interface (API) is a connection between computers or between computer programs. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how to build ...

GitHub GitHub () is a Proprietary software, proprietary developer platform that allows developers to create, store, manage, and share their code. It uses Git to provide distributed version control and GitHub itself provides access control, bug trackin ...

. In August 2011 Google announced that Chrome would support Web Intents. Google and

Mozilla Mozilla is a free software community founded in 1998 by members of Netscape. The Mozilla community uses, develops, publishes and supports Mozilla products, thereby promoting free software and open standards. The community is supported institution ...

have started co-operating to unify Web Intents and Mozilla's Web Activities (which tries to solve the same problem) into one proposal.Mozilla Labs: Web Apps Update – experiments in Web Activities, App Discovery
In November 2012, Greg Billock of

announced that experimental support of Web Intents had been removed from Chrome.

References

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External links

Web Intents introduction

Web Intents code on GitHub

Web Intents demos

Linux Weekly News: Differing intentions towards Web Intents

Mozilla's Web Activities
Google Web applications