We have a new beta version of the Blockstack Browser to share!
Download Links
New features and fixes
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TONS of end-to-end testing. We use Browserstack to spin up Selenium in a bunch of different environments, including MacOS, Windows, and Mobile Browsers. We then run a bunch of different tests that actually interact with the browser, especially around onboarding and signing in, but including other areas as well. We even have a ‘test’ Blockstack app that tests the flow all the way from a Blockstack app through sign up, and back. This should go a long way in terms of keeping things stable, and making sure no code we push breaks the onboarding flow. Thanks to @zone117x for doing all of this; getting Selenium to run smoothly in all these environments required a ton of work and manual tweaking.
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A new home page! Added by @aulneau.id . We used to have a ‘static’ fixed list of apps that we displayed on the home page of the Browser. Now, we pull data directly from app.co, so as soon as an app is on app.co, it’ll show up in the Browser. We use app mining data to create a ‘popular apps’ category at the top, and then show apps by category.
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‘Beta Mode’. When you’re running the native app, you can command-click (or ctrl-click on Windows) the tab bar icon and select ‘enable beta mode’. This will make sure that Blockstack apps always send you to https://beta.browser.blockstack.org for authentication requests. You can use this to test out the latest features, or take advantage of a bug fix as soon as possible. This URL is automatically built from the
developbranch on Github, so as soon as a commit lands there, a new build is created. -
‘Enable development mode’ on Windows. This was available on MacOS, and sends authentication requests to http://localhost:3000. This makes local development of the browser easier.
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Now, when using the native Blockstack Browser, if you log into a Blockstack app from a non-default browser, you’ll stay in the same browser you’re using. Before, you’d be sent to your default browser to log in.
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Fixed an issue that sometimes occurred when using your ‘magic recovery code’. This was caused by some odd Base64 encoding issues, but @zone117x found a fix!
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Now, your email address that you used during onboarding is saved in your local session. When apps request the ‘email’ scope, they will be granted the email (assuming you give permission). This was a feature that we’ve had for a while, but it rarely worked.
I might have missed some things, but you can see all the commits for this version on Github.