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I'm looking at what's required to develop a web page for the Kik Messenger in-app browser and I'm confused as to how the development workflow is supposed to work.

The API Docs say that "To launch your webpage in Kik simply open the sidebar and type in the URL to your webpage.", which would be fine except for the fact that the "sidebar" no longer exists in the current version of the app and it no longer seems to be possible to enter an arbitrary URL(*).

* EDIT: It looks like you can open an arbitrary URL in the browser by entering it into chat and then tapping on it.

Given these restrictions, how do folks test their web pages with the app? Do you have to just use the Chrome Extension until deployment?

Related question: How do you make Kik aware of your web page? Some of the other questions on this site imply that you have to wait for their web crawler to index it. Is that the case? If so, is exactly how this works documented anywhere? I feel like I've missed a doc link along the way.

AndrewR
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1 Answers1

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In December they removed the NEW Apps tab in the Discovery Section as well as the option to access arbitrary URLs. (as you pointed out) For testing I usually use the Chrome extension or access my testserver via an URL from a chat.

But since the NEW tab is currently removed, it is not very feasible to release new Kik Apps at the moment, since people would only be able to discover your App by using the Search function and getting into top 100 would be very unlikly this way. I contacted Kik if the removal of the NEW tab was a permanent change, to which I got the response that they are currently revamping their platform and new solutions on the way for the stuff they are moving.

So if u are currently working on a Kik App I would recommend waiting with releasing it until possible future updates of the Kik Browser are released.

As for your other question to make the crawler find you app, you simply have to add some Meta tags into your header:

<meta name="description" content="app description">
<link rel="kik-icon" href="your image")">
<link rel="canonical" href="your domain">
<script src="http://cdn.kik.com/kik/2.0.5/kik.js"></script>
Jakob Abfalter
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