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WKNavigationAction.sourceFrame is nil on iOS 15.4 & 16.6 despite non-optional Swift declaration (fixed in iOS 18.6)
Reproducibility 100% on iOS 15.4 and iOS 16.6 Zero crash on iOS 18.6 Xcode 26.1 Steps to Reproduce Xcode 26.1 → New iOS App Replace ViewController.swift with the 20-line code below Run on real device • iPhone XR iOS 15.4 • iPhone 13 iOS 16.6 Tap the link → breakpoint in decidePolicyFor lldb → po navigationAction.sourceFrame Actual Result (lldb) po navigationAction.sourceFrame nil Swift declaration lies: public var sourceFrame: WKFrameInfo { get } // non-optional → Instant EXC_BREAKPOINT libswiftFoundation.dylib`URLRequest._unconditionallyBridgeFromObjectiveC Objective-C tells the truth: po [(WKNavigationAction *)navigationAction fixedSourceFrame] nil iOS 18.6 → same code prints a valid WKFrameInfo, no crash. Expected sourceFrame must be declared WKFrameInfo? in Swift or at least documented “can be nil on iOS 15–16”. Impact Every WKWebView app that touches sourceFrame on iOS 15.4 & 16.6 ships with a latent crash. Production Workaround @implementation WKNavigationAction (Safe) (WKFrameInfo *)fixedSourceFrame { return self.sourceFrame ? self.sourceFrame : nil; } @end Minimal Test (copy-paste) import UIKit import WebKit class ViewController: UIViewController, WKNavigationDelegate { lazy var web = WKWebView(frame: view.bounds) override func viewDidLoad() { super.viewDidLoad() web.navigationDelegate = self view.addSubview(web) web.load(URLRequest(url: URL(string: "https://www.apple.com")!)) } func webView(_ webView: WKWebView, decidePolicyFor navigationAction: WKNavigationAction, preferences: WKWebpagePreferences, decisionHandler: @escaping (WKNavigationActionPolicy, WKWebpagePreferences)->Void) { print(navigationAction.sourceFrame) // ← crashes on 15.4 & 16.6 decisionHandler(.allow, preferences) } }
Topic: Safari & Web SubTopic: General Tags:
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SAML with SSO extension triggering twice
I am developing an SSO Extension so that I can have SSO with Keycloak across applications. OIDC/OAuth2 works very well. But I am struggling with SAML. It works, but it seems that the form submission is always triggered twice. I use decisionHandler(.cancel) to stop the form submission and redirect it to the browser. I still get the form submitted both by the extension and by the browser. At some point I tried to allow the form submission in the Extension so that I get the redirect with the response to the browser. It still triggered another submission. Does anyone experience this issue?
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High count of webview content process termination
Our iOS app uses React Native Webview (based on top of WKWebView) to display content. This webview stays in memory throughtout the app's lifecycle. We are observing a high number of webview content process terminations - around 15% of our sessions. (https://developer.apple.com/documentation/webkit/wknavigationdelegate/webviewwebcontentprocessdidterminate(_:)) What could be the reasons for it? Is there a way to know for sure? Is the 15% of sessions number something that other apps also experience, or should this be lower? Thanks!
Topic: Safari & Web SubTopic: General
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May ’25
WKWebView randomly does not send out cookies from WKWebSiteDataStore to our servers
PLATFORM AND VERSION iOS Development environment: Xcode 16.2, macOS 15.3.2 Run-time configuration: iOS 15-18 This happens in iOS, and leads to to the hybrid home page showing users as wrongly unauthenticated, since the at cookie is missing. For context, we have a JWT token that is stored in the Keychain, and on app launch, before any WKWebViews are created, we synchronize this to the WKWebsiteDataStore as an at cookie. We have analytics instrumentation on our websitef to show that WKWebView randomly refuses to send out any cookies. – The following is a snippet from an explanation to the WebKit Slack: We are having an issue on iOS, in which WKWebView loads pages (and even subsequent reloads) without any cookies, even though we have stored cookies in WKWebsiteDataStore.default() before hand right after application launch and becoming a key window. We reference this object, store it as a singleton, (as well as a process pool), and then all webview configurations are initialized with the same data store, the same process pool, every call on the main thread. From reading the source code, it seems that if the internal IPC logic fails, the APIs for deleting and setting data records and cookies fail without any feedback in completion handlers. This bug often happens when returning from the background on iOS after a few hours. Sometimes it happens on cold launches of the app. We have mitigated a similar issue (no cookies being sent) by implementing webViewWebContentProcessDidTerminate and reloading the webview ourselves, we found that whatever webview does to reload if that method is not implemented leads to cookies not being used. There have been multiple reports of WKWebView losing cookies in recent iOS versions, and we have tried to implement all of the workarounds listed. Setting a maximumAge to the cookies we store, and doing a _ = await websiteDataStore.dataRecords(ofTypes: Set([WKWebsiteDataTypeCookies])) before accessing or modifying websiteDataStore.httpCookieStore Question: is it safe to work with WKWebsiteDataStore before a WKWebView is added as a view, if so are there any timing considerations? Are there any logs that we can take a look at, this issue is very hard to reproduce, about 2% of our users face it at scale? Is there anything that could be happening within our process (runloop issues, timing) that could be causing this issue? See multiple reports from other companies that have faced the issue: "Now the Thermonuclear Problem with WKWebViewDataStorage" https://medium.com/axel-springer-tech/synchronization-of-native-and-webview-sessions-with-ios-9fe2199b44c9 STEPS TO REPRODUCE They don't exist, because the issue only happens at scale. We just know that no cookies are sent for a small percentage of requests. We believe this to be an issue in which Webkit fails to communicate internally with whatever IPC mechanisms it has. We have not been able to reproduce this issue consistently. The best we can give is that it happens after a few hours that the app is in the background. This happens regardless of whether the WKWebsiteDataStore is persistent or not, but seems to be much worse when it is persistent. Thus we have disabled persistnet data stores and relied on nonPersistent. The issue is bad enough that we are trying to move away from relying on cookies for iOS and just use request headers which we can only set on the top level request of WKWebView. DTS Case-ID: 13154329
Topic: Safari & Web SubTopic: General
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115
Apr ’25
Referer Header is not included for requests in WKWebView
"The Referer header allows a server to identify referring pages that people are visiting from or where requested resources are being used. " This header is never forwarded to server when the user is browsing the website in a WebView. This is properly maintained by other browsers but not in-app. How do I include it?
Topic: Safari & Web SubTopic: General
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Apr ’25
PerApp VPN Broken on iOS 18.2 if Huge Safari Domains Configure?
When configuring a Per-App VPN payload with 250+ Safari domains under a managed app, the VPN does not trigger for the other managed apps(like chrome etc). However, the same VPN successfully starts and works when used with Safari. Reducing the number of Safari domains in the VPN payload resolves the issue, allowing the VPN to trigger for the managed app as expected. Has anyone else faced this issue, and what's the workaround for it?
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511
Dec ’24
Console Snippets with JavaScript
Hey there guys! I'm new to this, and have been learning JavaScript on Udemy. I'm trying to do everything inside of Safari, instead of using Chrome. But I'm stuck on something that I feel is kind of small, but has been nagging at the back of my brain. When I go to the 'Inspector Developer Tools' (command + option + i), then go to 'Sources', and go to 'Console Snippets', I'm trying to figure out how to delete any JavaScript files from the Console Snippets selection. In Chrome, when you navigate to the Chrome equivalent, if I right click on the file, there's an option to remove the file, but on Safari the only option I get is to Run Console Snippet. Does anyone know how to remove or delete a JavaScript file from the Console Snippets section in Safari? I have no extensions installed.
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523
Dec ’24
Unable to Add Non-Standard Headers Using Declarative Net Request Rule (DNR) in Safari
We’re encountering an issue when trying to add non-standard headers to outgoing requests using Declarative Net Request (DNR) rules in our Safari Web Extension. Tested on macOS 15.4 with Safari 18.4. Specifically, when attempting to add a custom header such as "X-Custom-Header" using a DNR rule, the header does not appear in the request. We are able to add standard headers like "Authorization" and "Cookie" to the request successfully using the same method. This behavior suggests that Safari may be filtering or blocking non-standard headers when set via DNR rules, unlike other browsers. In Chrome and Firefox, the same rule adds the "X-Custom-Header" header without any issue. We are looking for assistance in fixing these issues and having our Safari Extension function the same as it does in Firefox and Chrome.
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116
Apr ’25
Launching MacOS app via Url Scheme
I'm looking for answer or documentation on gatekeeper and launching a MacOS app via a url scheme/custom protocol. Our application is delivered via a zip file downloaded from the web. We utilize a url scheme. The act of extracting the app from the zip registers the url scheme with the OS. From previous research/testing we found we had to break the gatekeeper lock (have the user move the app from the downloaded location) to ensure that the url is honored on first launch of the application. To ensure user compliance, we added a check to make sure that the lock has been removed by looking at the quarantine attribute. This flow is not ideal. I am looking for alternatives and was previously under the impression that if we were to move to a DMG then that would provide the user a better user experience for moving it. However, now that I am getting around to looking into it, I am seeing some implied statements that this is not the case and that the quarantine bit will just be moved from the DMG to the app. Questions: Does a DMG allow the app to be launched via custom protocol without prior launch or movement? With a notarized app, will the custom protocol work on a subsequent launch, even without prior movement?
Topic: Safari & Web SubTopic: General
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304
Oct ’25
Content blocker not removing content
I have a content blocker that generally works correctly, but I need to block an element that has certain text in it. For example, <span id="theId">Some text</span> is easy enough to block because I can locate the id and block that, but what if there is no id, or the id is completely random? What if it's just <span>Some text</span>? How do I block that? Let's say this is my only content blocker rule: [ { "action": { "type": "css-display-none", "selector": ":has-text(/Some text/i)" }, "trigger": { "url-filter": ".*" } } ] No errors are seen when the rule is loaded, so it's syntactically correct, it just doesn't block the HTML. I gather this is because :has-text() works on attributes, not contents, so it works on alt, href, aria-label etc. but not on the contents of the element itself. How do I block Some text in my example above? Thanks!
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608
Feb ’25
Not able to view PDF on a website when I open it in Safari browser.
When you open the Directorate General of civil Aviation, India website then in the top bar bring the cursor to “Regulations and Guidance” under that there will be a drop down which will give numerous options. In that go to Centre Column “Civil Aviation Requirements”. Then click on ”Section 7” then click on “Part II”. Actually on a laptop it’s a 4 page document but on my iPad it’s just an image of the first page. I can’t read any of the PDF’s.
Topic: Safari & Web SubTopic: General
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175
Feb ’25
WebKit HTML Anchor download attribute ignored by PDF files
When trying to create an anchor with the download attribute it does not work for PDF files, it displays the files inline. Also when the download attribute is set the target attribute is ignored too. The tag: ... The behavior: It displaies the file in line. The correct behavior: The file should be downloaded and not displayed or at least displayed but with the "_blank" target (new tab). This is an issue when working with WebSockets which is closed when the file is opened inline.
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196
Oct ’25
Safari Content Blocker fails to reload with large amount of rules (but under limit)
Hello, I am developing Safari Content Blocker extension and discovered that it frequently fails to load with large amount of rules. Currently I have over 45k and most of the time when I reload the extension on iOS 18 (iPhone 12) it ends with error: Error Domain=NSCocoaErrorDomain Code=4097 "connection to service named com.apple.SafariServices.ContentBlockerLoader" UserInfo={NSDebugDescription=connection to service named com.apple.SafariServices.ContentBlockerLoader} #0 And the simpler message is just: Couldn’t communicate with a helper application. From what I managed to find (for example here - https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/756931) the limit for blocking rules should be 150k items. It was previously 50k but got increased years ago. Is there anything special I need to do to get the extension to work reliably with say 100k items? I am usng the JSON format from the docs: { "trigger": { ... }, "action": { ... } }, { "trigger": { ... }, "action": { ... } } ] My trigger is url-filter and the action is type: block I was thinking about providing multiple JSON files in attachments property of NSExtensionItem but apparently that is not supported. Thanks for help!
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Feb ’25
iOS 18.2 Can't open X-Callback-URL from Safari Extension
I have a Safari Extension which replaces default new tab and puts a link on a generated new tab. This link can be either usual URL link, or a URL Scheme, something like plecoapi://x-callback-url/df?hw=${char}&sec=dict In iOS 17 and previosly, this link worked flawlessly. In iOS 18, including 18.2, this X-Callback-URL link works only once, if I kill Safari process, reopen Safari and tap the link. Each subsequent tap will just reload the page, link won't work anymore until the next Safari reload. Usual URL links works every time without a problem.
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493
Jan ’25
Safari tabs lost updating to macOS 15.4
Problem As the title says, Safari lost all my tabs once I updated to macOS 15.4. I do of course have "Safari opens with: All windows from last session" set. This has been my default for many years. Past Mitigation In the past I had a script that I could use to backup ~/Library/Safari that would save all my bookmarks and tabs. Unfortunately they made this method of backup non-function sometime around when tab groups were introduced. Suggestion Fortunately my tab groups are still intact. But this sort of problem doesn't give me a lot of confidence. I haven't had something like this happen in a while, but when it does happen, it's quite frustrating. Apple really needs to recognize that this sort of thing can and will happen and they should make it easier for users to manually save/restore their tabs. Problem with forums To add insult to injury, as I was typing this message in the forum, I decided to select "Edit Bookmarks"... which proceeded to replace the current window with my bookmarks, thereby losing my post! It did this without warning of page content changes (which I get from most other websites). I felt somewhat relieved that the forum had recognized a previous draft and offered for me to continue. However, when I selected it, it brought me back to an old post... that was actually posted! smh
Topic: Safari & Web SubTopic: General Tags:
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Apr ’25
Chrome extension => Safari web extension packager
"The Safari web extension packager enables you to package and distribute your Safari extensions using App Store Connect from any web browser, without requiring a Mac or access to Xcode." I upload the unzipped folder I'd test in Chrome://extensions to the Safari web extension packager in App store connect. I get error: Embedded binary's bundle identifier is not prefixed with the parent app's bundle identifier. The only solution i've seen to this error involves xcode/a mac, being without which doesn't help
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389
Oct ’25
Browser.tabs.create method "active"property not working on IOS 18.3
As of IOS 18.3, there browser.tabs.create methods active property which is supposed to determine whether a tab get open in the active window or not is not working as it should. I have the active property set to false but the tab still gets opened and is active on the window. Tested on older ios versions 18.2 and below and it works as it should. please advise
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Feb ’25