Chrome Extension won't run on pages with "redirect to external app" popup

[Eli Eliashar]

Hi,

We are facing an issue with our Chrome Extension: The chrome extension content script, won't run on web pages which, on load, show a small popup asking the user the permission to open the page in an external app. For example, when viewing this page:

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/genies-gems-puzzle-quests/id1032443533

The user is immediately asked to open the page in the App Store. In this case, the extension is not run at all, even though it would have been without this popup. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

[Cuyler Stuwe]

I would assume this is totally by design and that there’s little you can do about it directly on that page.

Seems to me that your only option would probably be to redirect requests to those pages to an intermediate page. Not sure how feasible this would be in an MV3 extension at this point.

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[Stefan vd]

Hi everyone,

@Elia

I try your research your issue with my Chrome extension MV2 that uses a content script (add automatically a Night switch on the current web page <= to get dark mode). In doing so, I can see the same problem you describe here, the Apple pop-up message appearing to open the third-party application. And that it doesn't run and puts the custom HTML code on the Apple App Store page.

However, when I try my Chrome extension MV3, I see no problem. It puts my custom night switch (bottom left) as you can see in my screenshot in this post.

Chrome Dev Version 101.0.4919.0 on a Chrome extension manifest v3.

Have you tried converting your Chrome extension to manifest v3?

Thanks,
Stefan vd

[Eli Eliashar]

Thanks all. I'll try to upgrade to MV3. I'm still using the 2 for certain reasons.

[Simeon Vincent]

Just did a little testing and it looks like my minimal MV2 behaves as expected. It might be worth digging more into where exactly your extensions is going off the rails.

manifest.json

{

"name": "Content scripts - inject on all pages",

"version": "1.0",

"manifest_version": 2,

"content_scripts": [

{

"matches": ["https://apps.apple.com/*"],

"js": ["content.js"],

"run_at": "document_start"

}

]

}

background.js

console.log('injecting a red square');

let el = document.createElement('div');

el.style.height = "100px";

el.style.position = "fixed";

el.style.width = "100px";

el.style.top = "0";

el.style.left = "0";

el.style.margin = "0";

el.style.padding = "0";

el.style.background = "red";

// document.body does not exist at this point

document.documentElement.append(el);

console.log('injected element', el);

Simeon - @dotproto

Chrome Extensions DevRel

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[Eli Eliashar]

Hi Simeon,

The background runs well but the content script does not unfortunately.

[Eli Eliashar]

After upgrading to MV3 I still experience this issue. Anyone managed to solve this? Is there any workaround?

[Stefan vd]

Hi Elia,

I can not confirm this issue in my manifest v3 Chrome extension, and Simeon can also not simulate this issue in manifest v2.

Could you share your code on Github (a simplistic version of your Chrome extension)? That will help us simulate this issue on our Chrome web browser.

Thanks,

Stefan vd

[Eli Eliashar]

Hi,

So Simon was able to run his extension as his code was run by the background script and not by a content script.

Regarding you being able to run your extension with MV3 - can you please post your manifest file? Maybe I am missing something. 

Otherwise, I can crearte a mini version of my extension but it will take me some time as it is a large complicated extension with some confidencial parts.

Thanks again!

On Mon, Mar 21, 2022 at 12:12 PM Ilay Eliashar <il...@storemaven.com> wrote:

Hi,

So Simon was able to run his extension as his code was run by the background script and not by a content script.

Regarding you being able to run your extension with MV3 - can you please post your manifest file? Maybe I am missing something. 

Otherwise, I can crearte a mini version of my extension but it will take me some time as it is a large complicated extension with some confidencial parts.

Thanks again!

[Stefan vd]

Hi Elia,

I think that @Simeon did just a typo, "background.js" => is really "content.js" in his code sample.

Here is my manifest v3 code.

manifest.json

{

"name": "Test extenstion",

"description": "Test Extension!",

"version": "1.0",

"manifest_version": 3,

"background": {

"service_worker": "background.js"

},

"content_scripts": [

{

"matches": ["https://apps.apple.com/*"],

"js": ["content.js"],

"run_at": "document_start",

"all_frames": true

},

{

"matches": ["https://apps.apple.com/*"],

"css" : ["style.css"]

}

],

"action": {},

"permissions": ["storage", "activeTab", "scripting"],

"minimum_chrome_version": "99"

}

background.js

chrome.action.onClicked.addListener((tab) => {

chrome.scripting.executeScript({

target: {tabId: tab.id},

files: ['script.js']

});

});

script.js

alert("done run script");

content.js

console.log("Start content injection");

if(document.documentElement){

var newswitch = document.createElement("div");

newswitch.id = "stefanswitch"

newswitch.className = "stefanswitch";

document.documentElement.append(newswitch);

}

console.log("End content injection");

style.css

.stefanswitch{z-index:100000;position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:200px;height:200px;background:red}

Thanks,

Stefan vd

[Eli Eliashar]

Ok - solved it:

Seems like the "run_at" field is a game changer here. The default value is "document_end" - but then nothing would run. Once I changed it to "document_start", the content script is running before the popup that is shown to the user.

Thanks :)

[Stefan vd]

Hi Elia,

I am glad you solved your problem.

Have a nice Chromie day there.

Thanks,

Stefan vd

[Tarun Khandelwal]

Hi, 

I am also facing the same issue, but I can't run the app on "document_start" as my extension depends on the content of the webpage so is there any other solution this ?

[hrg...@gmail.com]

Does your content script run if you click the "Cancel" button in that dialog box?

[Tarun Khandelwal]

No it doesn't.

[hrg...@gmail.com]

Then you can inject the content script at document_start and add an event listener for the "load" event or the "DOMContentLoaded" event.

The webpage content that your script depends on should be available when one of those events fire.

[Tarun Khandelwal]

Thanks hrg for the help, the solution worked!