Automatic deep linking

[trin4ik]

my opinion, expo/router killer-feature is provision "free" deep linking. for now linking config for NavigationContainer generating automatically by getLinkingConfig method. Generates only path and screens props

Problem:

no way to set initialRouteName to linking config (react-navigation docs). its needed for some cases:

• when start app with deep link to modal (and you need present modal as modal), solved this in modal deep link breaks all modals #27, need initialRouteName in linking config
• when start app with deep link like /profile/orders/3 you need initialRouteName on each Navigator levels, or you get wrong back navigation logic

need to remember, initialRouteName in linking config !== initialRouteName in Navigator props. they have different logic (hi @nandorojo react-navigation #10152)

Solutions (as I can see)

• providing access to modify linking config. i think its not bad practice, but not for this case. i think expo/router can and should solve this case automatically
• parsing initialRouteName from Navigator and set it to linking options. i tried to do this in Add initialRouteName to linking config #45 pr. the problem is that linking config loads before Navigator rendering. i tried parse component as string, but @EvanBacon right, its stupid. but even if we find a way safety prerender or start app only after loads all screens and generated linking config, initialRouteName from linking and Navigator still have different logic. i think its bad practice.
• autogenerate initialRouteName based on expo/router sorted. sounds like solution and all changes we need at /src/getLinkingConfig.ts:

- 58     return [node.route, { path, screens }] as const;
+ 58     return [node.route, { path, screens, initialRouteName: node.children[0].route }] as const;

its will solve all problems it this case.
omg, such a simple solution that I don't know why I wrote so much. but in future I think we need tools to merge linking config with custom config.
when i starts wrote this discussion, I thought I'd end with a question: "What do you think about it?". but it seems that the solution came by itself while I was writing 🤷‍♂️

[AlvSovereign]

I for one would love to have the linking config exposed.

I'm currently dealing with handling authentication that uses a hash in the deep link URL, which Expo Router does not handle as a search param and therefore cannot find the screen needed to deal with auth tokens.

This was easily achievable via React Navigation which needed a linking prop, where I could customise the config to rewrite the incoming URL to replace the # with a ?.

[avk-holion]

Did you find any soloution for this problem?

[AlvSovereign]

I am relying on the patch I wrote, here: #245 (comment)

This was during the Expo Router RC so I do not know if things have changed in this file, or if there is a new way of editing this config