dynamic link depending upon the history of the window

[hsriat]

I add a link on the onload event of the body.
The link is displayed as BACK if the page is opened from another page, but if the page is opened in a new window, its displayed as CLOSE

Here's the function.

function loadLink() {
document.getElementById('link').innerHTML = history.length>1 ? '<a class="button" href="#back" onclick="history.back();return false;">&nbsp;Go Back&nbsp;</a>' : '<a class="button" href="#close" onclick="window.close();return false;">&nbsp;Close window&nbsp;</a>';
}

But the problem is.... history.length starts from 0 in Opera, Safari and IE, but starts from 1 in Firefox.

So how can I rewrite it without checking for which browser it is?

[acoder]

You obviously can't depend on history.length, so you'll have to think of another way.

One possibility is to check document.referrer, but that depends on your application.

Another I can think of is to use cookies which you can set to determine history length.

[hsriat]

If I use document.referrer, it would not work for the window if opened with a link with target="_blank" attribute. It would still return the referrer, while window doesn't have any history.

I'm trying to implement this in an error page. And that page can either be loaded in the same window, or a new window if corresponding link is targeted to _blank.

So if loaded in same window, it should show Back button, but if loaded in new window, it should show Close button.

So as for now, I would let the condition history.length>1 be there. As it covers both the conditions ie. history.length>1 & history.length>0. Just 1% would be exceptional case.

Thanks for your reply. :)

[acoder]

Have you tried the cookie option? Set the cookie depending on whether the target is "_blank" or not.

[hsriat]

Have you tried the cookie option? Set the cookie depending on whether the target is "_blank" or not.

Actually this error page can be shown at any page if there's any trouble with the get parameters or the request wasn't valid or the user doesn't have right to view that page. And moreover its not a separate error page (something like show_error.php), but the requested page itself shows the error, without sending the redirecting headers.

So to implement cookies, I don't want to modify all the pages (Is that what you mean? or I'm not getting you?).

Moreover, the website is going to be used by few know people, and I've already recommended them to use Firefox :D. And by now all of them have started using Firefox and are happy with that. ;)

[acoder]

Well, in that case, all is well and good.