Forum Discussion

TheShaunSaw's avatar
TheShaunSaw
Silver Contributor
Aug 23, 2020

What happened to back button and refresh button on YouTube PWA

I today installed YouTube PWA from the Microsoft Edge Canary channel and what I saw is the back and refresh buttons on the left of titlebar are missing. I only saw it on the YouTube PWA. Has anyone e...
Microsoft Edge Canary
progressive web app
  • johnjansen's avatar
    johnjansen
    Aug 24, 2020

    TheShaunSaw thanks for the feedback on this. It's actually by design at present. The YouTube manifest includes the displaymode property for "standalone" which the w3c spec indicates should not have an address bar nor other UI components, though browsers MAY include a "status bar" and a "back button". The displaymode that includes refresh and back is called "minimal-ui". I'm not sure why youtube opted for standalone.

     

    I'll do some follow up with that, as well as possibly reconsider our design and start including the back button if nothing else...

     

    -John

Gryphou's avatar
Gryphou
Copper Contributor
Sep 15, 2020

TheShaunSaw @johnjansen eguifThis is not a solution, navigation becomes a real purge.
I'm not going to tell all sites to change their configuration...

The return arrow is a minimum for normal navigation.

 

For Youtube for example, if I want to go back to a channel, it's impossible without having to go back to the home page, it's ridiculous.

  • eguif's avatar
    eguif
    Steel Contributor
    Sep 15, 2020

    Hello Gryphou 

     

    Of course, this is far from a solution

    As I mentioned, alternatively you can use the F5 button to refresh the page

    You mentioned that you just want to go back to the previous page
    Again, alternatively you can go to edge://flags/#edge-backspace-key-navigate-page-back and activate this flag

     

    After that, you can use the backspace button

    • Gryphou's avatar
      Gryphou
      Copper Contributor
      Sep 15, 2020

      eguifWhat version of edge do you use ? I don't have this flag. I'm on the v85.0.564.51

      • eguif's avatar
        eguif
        Steel Contributor
        Sep 15, 2020

        Hello Gryphou 

         

        Probably this flag has not yet arrived in the stable version

        I use the dev version 87.0.634.0

  • eguif's avatar
    eguif
    Steel Contributor
    Sep 16, 2020

    Hello Gryphou 

     

    You can read about what a reddit user has posted and if it will work for you

    I haven't tested

    https://www.reddit.com/r/MicrosoftEdge/comments/itpijg/do_you_use_pwas_do_you_use_the_dark_theme_these/

     

    In a certain excerpt he says "PWA Manifest Remover: This one overrides the manifest.json some sites have. Lets be honest, I don't know a single site that uses the manifest correctly. Sites like YouTube and Twitter remove the" back "button either deliberately or by accident because Edge follows the settings of their manifest.json files.Even this site, Reddit, has an incorrect name for the PWA ("App" instead of "Reddit"). This script fixes that. If you already have a YouTube PWA, remove it and create the PWA after this userscript loads, and the back button should return. "

Resources