Launch app if installed or redirect to download - windows

It's true, GitHub Conduit is only for GitHub for Mac. So how does the GitHub website determine if GitHub for Windows is installed?

Well, GitHub for Windows is apparently much-less sophisticated in this regard. The "Clone in Desktop" will only work once you have installed GitHub for Windows and authenticated your account using the "Add account" button under options.

Once you have done this, so long as you are logged into the GitHub account you added to GitHub for Windows, the "Clone in Desktop" link will have the github-windows:// protocol, rather than the https://windows.github.com/ link.

But what happens if you login to GitHub on a computer that does not have GitHub for Windows installed and click the button? It has the same link, which will not work for obvious reasons.

Yep, GitHub apparently blindly assumes that when your are using your account on a Windows computer, you must have GitHub for Windows installed.

You can try the cross-browser custom protocol detection library which is written in JavaScript: https://github.com/ismailhabib/custom-protocol-detection

...or do something hacky like modifying browser's user agent during installation of your application.