Swift 3 UIWebView open (YouTube logo/watermark hyperlink from video) in Safari

Question

Using Swift 3 and UIWebView how do I force the YouTube logo/watermark “Hyperlink” that is displayed in a YouTube video playing through a webpage IFrame to open in Safari?

I am using a UIWebView (can’t transition to WKWebView just yet.) to display a web page that plays a YouTube video in an IFrame.

Following the “YouTube Embedded Players and Player Parameters” instructions at https://developers.google.com/youtube/player_parameters?csw=1#modestbranding. I was able to remove the title and share button from the top of the video using showinfo=0. This only leaves the YouTube logo/watermark.

When you click on the YouTube logo/watermark it opens YouTube inside my app, which is not good for the user navigation experience.

If a user clicks the YouTube logo/watermark I need this link to open in Safari. I have tried using the code shown below without success. The code works on every other link in the UIWebView but not on the YouTube logo/watermark hyperlink embedded in the actual video.

// ViewController.swift

import UIKit

class ViewController: UIViewController, UIWebViewDelegate {

@IBOutlet var webView: UIWebView!
override func viewDidLoad() {
    super.viewDidLoad()
    webView.delegate = self
    if let url = URL(string: "http://www.example.com") {
        let request = URLRequest(url: url)
        webView.loadRequest(request)
    }
}


//Force all links to open in Safari.
func webView(_ webView: UIWebView, shouldStartLoadWith request: URLRequest, navigationType: UIWebViewNavigationType) -> Bool {
    if let url = request.url, navigationType == UIWebViewNavigationType.linkClicked {
        UIApplication.shared.openURL(url)
        return false
   }
    return true
}}

I was able to achieve this in the android version of my app using the example at WebView link click open default browser.

I have spent a week trying to figure this out so as not to waste any ones time with a question that has already been answered. Any help in figuring this out would be appreciated. Thank you!

Answer 1

Try UIWebViewNavigationType.other to catch youtube.com/watch url insted of linkClicked:

func webView(_ webView: UIWebView, shouldStartLoadWith request: URLRequest, navigationType: UIWebViewNavigationType) -> Bool {
    if let url = request.url, navigationType == UIWebViewNavigationType.other {

        // catch "youtube.com/watch" and let safari to open link

        return false
   }
    return true
}}

Answer 2

I'm looking for the exact same solution and I'm wondering if anyone can help on this matter

I tried it with the following code snippet

func webView(_ webView: UIWebView, shouldStartLoadWith request: URLRequest, navigationType: UIWebViewNavigationType) -> Bool {
    if navigationType == UIWebViewNavigationType.linkClicked {
        guard let abURL = request.url else { return true }
        let abRequest = URLRequest(url: abURL)
        print(abURL)
        print(abRequest)
        if abURL.absoluteString.range(of: "youtube") != nil {
            // Open links in Safari
            if #available(iOS 10.0, *) {
                UIApplication.shared.open(abURL, options: [:], completionHandler: nil)
            } else {
                UIApplication.shared.openURL(abURL)
            }
        } else {
            // Open links in Webview
            webView.loadRequest(abRequest)
        }
        return false
    }
    return true
}

On line 5/6 I print the url if a link is clicked and when I click on that Youtube Watermark inside the video (included as a iframe) I don't get a print of that url so my guess is that swift doesn't "know" that a link is clicked. All the other links are working and printing the url.

I also included an iframe with just a link to youtube in it

<a href="https://youtube.com">Youtube Link</a>

and this link works and I can print the url and it opens in safari so the problem must be with the link inside the youtube embed container