Why is this Google Chrome (Hosted) App invalid for Kiosk mode?

Question

I have been trying to make a Kiosk Mode App from my Chrome book. But when I go into the "Manage Kiosk Applications" and enter in the Chrome Store URL for my app, I get a "Invalid Application" error, but if i just install the app from the store, it installs just fine (though it doesn't appear Extension page, but does in the applications menu).

So I assume I have done something incorrectly with App manifest. here is my manifest (just changed the names and urls as it's private application)

{
  "name": "App Name",
  "description": "App Description",
  "manifest_version": 2,
  "version": "1",
  "app": {
    "urls": [
      "http://my.domain.com/"
    ],
    "launch": {
      "web_url": "http://my.domain.com/app.html"
    }
  },
  "icons": {
    "128": "icon_128.png"
  },
  "kiosk_enabled": true
}

From what I understood I just needed the "kiosk_enabled": true included in the manifest. Does anyone know what I have done wrong?

Answer 1

This is currently not well documented but your app is invalid for kiosk mode use in Chrome. I have been through the same circle as you and only after much research am I able to state the above - I found this old question during my research and am now returning to add a proper answer in the hope of saving others work in the future.

The type of app you have created is called a Hosted App - these apps are basically just shortcuts to existing Web sites. They contain this in the app part of the manifest.json:

"app": {
  "urls": ["http://mydomain/homepage/"],
  "launch": { "web_url": "http://mydomain/homepage/" }
},

I'd love to be able to link to some documentation that states hosted apps cannot be kiosk enabled definitively, but currently there is none. This fact has been confirmed to me by Google support though and an internal issue has been created to improve the documentation.

The fact that you can add this app into the CWS is down to lack of validation of this fact on app submission, this currently also has an internal ticket created so at sometime in the future will also be fixed. If you attempt to add the app into Chrome manually (not using CWS) you actually get proper validation and the add will fail with an error message. The message on Windows appears to state hosted apps cannot be kiosk enabled, other platforms do not have a message that is quite so informative but it does fail.

Answer 2

This is more a comment than an answer, I do however not have enough reputation to comment, so I can do this or nothing, I think this is more usefull to anyone having this problem. I am facing the same problem and am still trying to fix it.

When I install the Kiosk app from the Chrome app store (https://chrome.google.com/webstore/) on my Chrome Box it is installed and it can be successfully installed as an Kiosk app (it can be added to the list of kiosk apps in the extension settings screen (chrome://extensions/)). The source of this app is on Github at: https://github.com/zebradog/kiosk. I took the source and created a zip file of this app and imported it in my developer dashboard. I then published it to a private group of testers (me basically) and installed this app on my Chrome Box from the Chrome app store. The interesting thing is that this app cannot be added to the list of kiosk apps.

This either means the code on GitHub is not current with the published app in the Chrome app store, although the version number is the same, or the problem has something to do with my account or the fact that I published the app privately instead of publically.

I contacted the author of the Kiosk app but have not heared from him.

I hope this might help someone, I will continue to try and get my app to install as a kiosk app. When I do I will update this comment/answer.