Hi all,

I would like to ship a configuration profile with my iPhone application, and install it if needed.

Mind you, we're talking about a configuration profile, not a provisioning profile.

First off, such a task is possible. If you place a config profile on a Web page and click on it from Safari, it will get installed. If you e-mail a profile and click the attachment, it will install as well. "Installed" in this case means "The installation UI is invoked" - but I could not even get that far.

So I was working under the theory that initiating a profile installation involves navigating to it as a URL. I added the profile to my app bundle.

A) First, I tried [sharedApp openURL] with the file:// URL into my bundle. No such luck - nothing happens.

B) I then added an HTML page to my bundle that has a link to the profile, and loaded it into a UIWebView. Clicking on the link does nothing. Loading an identical page from a Web server in Safari, however, works fine - the link is clickable, the profile installs. I provided a UIWebViewDelegate, answering YES to every navigation request - no difference.

C) Then I tried to load the same Web page from my bundle in Safari (using [sharedApp openURL] - nothing happens. I guess, Safari cannot see files inside my app bundle.

D) Uploading the page and the profile on a Web server is doable, but a pain on the organizational level, not to mention an extra source of failures (what if no 3G coverage? etc.).

So my big question is: how do I install a profile programmatically?

And the little questions are: what can make a link non-clickable within a UIWebView? Is it possible to load a file:// URL from my bundle in Safari? If not, is there a local location on iPhone where I can place files and Safari can find them?

EDIT on B): the problem is somehow in the fact that we're linking to a profile. I renamed it from .mobileconfig to .xml ('cause it's really XML), altered the link. And the link worked in my UIWebView. Renamed it back - same stuff. It looks as if UIWebView is reluctant to do application-wide stuff - since installation of the profile closes the app. I tried telling it that it's OK - by means of UIWebViewDelegate - but that did not convince. Same behavior for mailto: URLs within UIWebView.

For mailto: URLs the common technique is to translate them into [openURL] calls, but that doesn't quite work for my case, see scenario A.

For itms: URLs, however, UIWebView works as expected...

EDIT2: tried feeding a data URL to Safari via [openURL] - does not work, see here: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/641461/iphone-open-data-url-in-safari

EDIT3: found a lot of info on how Safari does not support file:// URLs. UIWebView, however, very much does. Also, Safari on the simulator open them just fine. The latter bit is the most frustrating.