Web shortcuts for Android

This article describes Miradore's web shortcut configuration profile for Android. This configuration is available only for customers with the Premium Plan. The web shortcut configuration requires Miradore's Android client version 2.3.2 or newer.

Please note that for modern Android devices, that are controlled through Android Enterprise, it is recommended to deploy shortcuts using the managed Google Play.

The function of the web shortcut configuration profile

The Web shortcut configuration profile allows an administrator to create URL shortcuts to the home screen of a target device. The administrator can upload a custom icon for the shortcut, or use the default provided by Miradore. When the end user clicks a shortcut, it will invoke the default handler for that URL type. Typically for standard web shortcuts, a web browser is opened, but it always depends on what kind of applications the end user has installed on the target device.

Even though the profile is named web shortcut, it is also possible to create shortcuts with URLs that are not HTTP or HTTPS. What happens when the shortcut is clicked always depends on the target device, whether it has an application installed that knows how to handle that URL. You could use protocols such as ftp:// etc. If no protocol is defined in the address, it is assumed that it is a HTTP-shortcut.

How to deploy a web shortcut configuration to a device?

First, you need to create a new configuration profile and define the shortcut settings. Start by navigating to Mobile management > Configuration profiles and creating a web shortcut configuration for Android. See Creating a configuration profile for more details.

Shortcuts have two mandatory settings. A title, and a URL. The icon is optional. If a custom icon is not uploaded, a default icon provided by Miradore is used.

Limitations

Whether this configuration works or not depends solely on the home screen application (launcher) used in the target device. As the end users may use a custom home screen application that does not support remote creation of home screen shortcuts, we cannot guarantee that this configuration will work on all your devices.

It is not possible to check programmatically if the home screen has a certain shortcut added, so the deployment is marked completed immediately after the client receives the configuration. Due to reasons explained in the previous paragraphs, this does not mean the shortcut has actually been created.

For the same reasons we cannot guarantee that a shortcut is created, and we also cannot guarantee that a previously created shortcut is removed. For example, Google has removed support for removing shortcuts from the current versions of its home screen applications. So even though a shortcut can be created, it can't be removed programmatically.

How to remove deployed shortcuts?

Shortcuts can be removed by simply deleting the deployed configuration profile from the device. This can be done by opening the device page and clicking the trashcan icon in the Configuration profiles table. See Removing deployed configuration profiles for further information.

Please note however that your shortcut may not be removed. See the Limitations section above for more details.