How to programmatically invoke the native datepicker on a mobile device

I want to programmatically kick off the native datepicker on my web page (that is run on iOS and Android). I know that I can use <input type="date" but that would require user input.

How do I kick it off programmatically?

Answer

You don’t.

You can’t tell (/force) the phone to show the date-picker without a user touching a date input.

Which is a good thing, because (at least on iOS) the native datepicker hides the normal browser controls at the bottom of the screen.