Solution: Dynamic Links without Website

[lvillacin]

UPDATE
So did some digging and research and I think I understand it more. To better phrase my question, can I supply a uri scheme e.g. yapper://user/lvillacin as a link for dynamic links? Would that work? I currently don't have a website nor a web version of the app so I can't provide a valid URL. Thank you!

Old Post:
Hi I'm just about to implement deep linking in my app using Dynamic Links and have a few questions regarding how it all works. Specifically when we generate the deep link within the app itself, what is this "link" that I am supposed to provide?

I am talking about link: https://invertase.io that you can see below.

async function buildLink() {
  const link = await dynamicLinks().buildLink({
    link: 'https://invertase.io',
    // domainUriPrefix is created in your Firebase console
    domainUriPrefix: 'https://xyz.page.link',
    // optional set up which updates Firebase analytics campaign
    // "banner". This also needs setting up before hand
    analytics: {
      campaign: 'banner',
    },
  });

  return link;
}

According to the Firebase official docs this 'link' is supposed to be:
The link your app will open. Specify a URL that your app can handle, typically the app's content or payload, which initiates app-specific logic (such as crediting the user with a coupon or displaying a welcome screen). This link must be a well-formatted URL, be properly URL-encoded, use either HTTP or HTTPS, and cannot be another Dynamic Link.

The only URL that my app can handle right now is yapper:// and is what is configured as I used it in my AWS auth and React Navigation Deeplinking.

Do I need a website since I need an https link? I do not have a web version of my app so how am I supposed to do this. Or, am I allowed to supply yapper:// as the link and simply add params that ill be needing with React Navigation?

Thank you very much. I am a complete newbie here so any help would be great.

[lvillacin]

SOLUTION

Initial Problem: I couldn't provide a Deeplink Url since I did not have a website for my app and am just currently using a notion page as my landing page.

I also just couldn't provide a random URL that I did not own and just use logic within the app to extract the path that I needed because 1, i don't own it haha and more importantly when a user opens the link in the web, it opens the random URL that I provide so that can't be.

I suppose providing a random URL could actually work if you could provide an ofl fallback URL. However, whilst this is available with the iOS and Android SDKs for Firebase, it isn't for React Native.

The solution that I came up with is:

1. Initialize Firebase Hosting and simply set it to redirect all traffic to my notion page.
2. Provide the free Firebase Hosting Url (https://www.myapp.web.app) as the Deeplink Url for Firebase Dynamic Links
3. I then simply append my custom parameters at the end of that url which I handle using inapp logic.

All in all, dynamically generating the link looks like this:

const createLink = () => {
        dynamicLinks().buildShortLink({
            link: `https://myapp.web.app/${variable}`,
            domainUriPrefix: 'https://myapp.page.link',
            android: {
                packageName: 'com.app',
            },
            ios: {
                bundleId: 'com.app.app',
                appStoreId: '123456789,
            },
            social: {
                title: `Title`,
                descriptionText: `Description`,
                imageUrl: 'imageurl.jpeg',
            },
        }, dynamicLinks.ShortLinkType.SHORT)
            .then(link => {
                Share.open({
                    url: link
                })
            })
    }

Hope this helps anyone out there!