Allow Brave to Handle Searches from Windows Shell and Cortana

Description

Even when Brave is the default browser, the user may still find themselves unintentionally using Microsoft Edge. This is because searches from the start menu and elsewhere in Windows open results in Microsoft Edge, rather than in the user’s preferred browser.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Set Brave as your default browser on Windows 10
2. Press the Windows Key
3. Type “brave deviations from chromium”
4. Press Enter

Actual result:

Results are opened in Microsoft Edge.

Expected result:

Results are opened in Brave (if Brave is the default browser).

Reproduces how often:

Always.

Brave version (brave://version info)

1.19.88

Miscellaneous Information:

Note: The “Command” portion is caused by Windows thinking “deviations from chromium” should be passed as arguments to the “brave” executable. As such, selecting that option opens 3 new tabs in Brave (i.e. /deviations, /from, /chromium), which is clearly not the intended result, and is wholly unrelated to this issue 😃

[simonhong]

When brave is set as a default app for microsoft-edge protocol via control panel ,

additional command line args are passed like below. Brave browser needs to fetch url and load it.

microsoft-edge:?launchContext1=Microsoft.Windows.Cortana_cw5n1h2txyewy&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bing.com%2Fsearch%3Fq%3Dtest%26form%3DWNSGPH%26qs%3DSW%26cvid%3D935e77bf08484a92a230ddb119a8e594%26pq%3Dtest%26cc%3DKR%26setlang%3Den-US%26nclid%3D9896661371B25E91DFE2753D62351D4A%26ts%3D1629177294875%26nclidts%3D1629177294%26tsms%3D875%26wsso%3DModerate

another example - uninstall survey from chrome

microsoft-edge:https://support.google.com/chrome?p=chrome_uninstall_survey&crversion=94.0.4603.0&os=10.0.19041

Below is full command line when brave is launched via windows search panel.

"C:\Program Files\BraveSoftware\Brave-Browser-Nightly\Application\brave.exe" --enable-dom-distiller --disable-domain-reliability --no-pings --origin-trial-public-key=bYUKPJoPnCxeNvu72j4EmPuK7tr1PAC7SHh8ld9Mw3E=,fMS4mpO6buLQ/QMd+zJmxzty/VQ6B1EUZqoCU04zoRU= --sync-url=https://sync-v2.brave.com/v2 --lso-url=https://no-thanks.invalid --variations-server-url=https://variations.brave.com/seed --enable-features=LegacyTLSEnforced,WebUIDarkMode,PrefetchPrivacyChanges,PasswordImport,ReducedReferrerGranularity,AutoupgradeMixedContent,SafetyTip,WinrtGeolocationImplementation --disable-features=AutofillEnableAccountWalletStorage,FledgeInterestGroupAPI,HandwritingRecognitionWebPlatformApi,TrustTokens,DirectSockets,HandwritingRecognitionWebPlatformApiFinch,FlocIdComputedEventLogging,SignedExchangePrefetchCacheForNavigations,NetworkTimeServiceQuerying,SubresourceWebBundles,InterestCohortAPIOriginTrial,FirstPartySets,FederatedLearningOfCohorts,PrivacySandboxSettings,FledgeInterestGroups,InterestCohortFeaturePolicy,NotificationTriggers,WebOTP,AutofillServerCommunication,LiveCaption,LangClientHintHeader,IdleDetection,SignedExchangeSubresourcePrefetch,EnablePasswordsAccountStorage,TextFragmentAnchor,EnableProfilePickerOnStartup --flag-switches-begin --enable-features=LegacyTLSEnforced,WebUIDarkMode,PrefetchPrivacyChanges,PasswordImport,ReducedReferrerGranularity,AutoupgradeMixedContent,SafetyTip,WinrtGeolocationImplementation,Sidebar --flag-switches-end microsoft-edge:?launchContext1=Microsoft.Windows.Cortana_cw5n1h2txyewy&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bing.com%2Fsearch%3Fq%3Dtest%26form%3DWNSGPH%26qs%3DSW%26cvid%3D935e77bf08484a92a230ddb119a8e594%26pq%3Dtest%26cc%3DKR%26setlang%3Den-US%26nclid%3D9896661371B25E91DFE2753D62351D4A%26ts%3D1629177294875%26nclidts%3D1629177294%26tsms%3D875%26wsso%3DModerate

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To make Brave as a microsoft-edge protocol suported app, Brave should have microsoft-edge entry in URLAssociations like below.

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When Brave is set a a default app for microsoft-edge, registry is set like below.

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When I try to set default app for microsoft-edge protocol manually w/o using control panel, it doesn’t work. I can set reg value but it’s reverted to edge by Windows OS. I think we should launch control panel for setting this like we do for default browser app.

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When Brave is set as a default app for microsoft-edge protocol, we just need to delete regstry UserChoice value for this protocol while uninstalling Brave. Then, edge will be set implicitely. When Brave is set as a default app for microsoft-edge protocol, we don’t need to do anything during the uninstall. When uninstalled app is still set as a default app for microsoft-edge, Windows will ask again to users to choose default app for it.

[bsclifton]

This would be a great one to do- we’d need to make it an option (under System maybe?) in settings defaulted to false. When toggled, it could update the registry. The hardest part would be the parsing of the microsoft-edge: if we didn’t consider using an existing library (like EdgeDeflector)