That definitely makes sense too!
What - you donât consider stealing away users choices a valid consideration.
If the target attribute was actually useful to cisitors then theyâd have modified it so that you can specify whether you are targetting a new window or a new tab. Since tabs never existed back when it was valid there was no way to tell it which of the two to target because back then there was only one.
it still is valid! perhaps you mean when it was introduced?!
Also you are picking on one tiny element of web design/ UX as though it is the single most important factor. Since there arenât (from what i can see) huge amounts of study into the pros and cons of one way or another perhaps it isnât actually as important as either of us think.
Every choice a designer makes on a web page is making a decision on behalf of a user. If i put a horizontal menu with drop downs i will be taking the choice away from the user of having a vertical open static menu. If i use flash i annoy everyone who doesnât want to use flash, or JS or animated gifs or anything else that i decide i want that someone might not. That is where stats packages come into play as you can then make choices and see if it has an effect either pos or neg. Most general users (imo) donât care or even know there are any standards or âcorrectâ ways of doing things, as long as they can see what is happening and finding the information they want they will continue. Itâs like the â3 clickâ rule everyone talked about for ages, which iâve seen a study that says actually users will click far more times than that as long as the path they are taking is clear.
The user always has a choice and that is if they donât like it they can leave! I am not holding anyone hostage. If your bounce rate is low then well done but there will be people who donât like what you have done on your sites, whether you believe it to be 100% correct or not. The web would be a pretty boring place if we all did things exactly the same way.
What - you donât consider stealing away users choices a valid consideration.
No, not especially, because:
That doesnât mean that forcing new tab/window is appropriate; but it means that I donât consider the taking of a userâs choice in a particular interaction to be the deciding factor here at all. Everything you do in construction of an application or site takes away some choice, however arbitrary or inane it seems.
No - it was introduced in January 1997 and was declared to be obsolete in December 1997. It was only actually valid between those dates.
It was made obsolete then because it was realised that stealing users choices was an inappropriate thing for anyone to do.
Yes designers make choices for their users but not allowing users to choose when the browser is specifically designed to allow them except if you use an antiquated command to block user choice is stupid.
Anyway it doesnât affect me because my browser strips that obsolete code out of web pages so that I do get to choose - and I generally choose to stay in the same tab unless I have a specific reason to open another one.
So you still have a choice then!
But it is listed in the HTML5 documents? and doesnât fail any validator iâve tried and for something that is obsolete it sure gets used rather a lot!
I feel we might have been here before so i donât think weâll ever agreeâŚ
Thatâs the reason the browsers didnât delete it - if people want to drive visitors away from their site by using code found to do so then they let them.
any links so i can come to the same conclusion?
thinking about this another way. It would be easy enough to provide an option to turn on all external site links to _blank if the user wanted to. Could save using a cookie (if they have JS enabled) so it remembers for return visits.
surely that would actually be better than forcing the user one way or another. Let them decide!
They have the choice (without you having to do anything at all) between same tab, new tab or new window just by right clicking on the link - provided there isnât a target attribute on the link to remove one of those choices. Anything you do can only remove choices as the browser provides the maximum number of choices by default. So only by adding a target attribute are you reducing user choice.
So to let them decide you delete all target attributes.
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There are also keyboard shortcuts to open links in new tabs or windows, and on Linux, middle-click will open a link in a new tab. So the user not only has a choice of where to open a link, but also a choice of how to do it.
Sorry, but that makes no sense to me. Please can you elaborate?
Google will only ignore a link if the site owner has chosen to mark it as ânofollowâ, for whatever reason. Doing so is perfectly valid, and will have no ill-effect on your site.
If you have a lot of outgoing, Spammy links which are not marked as nofollow, then Google may regard your site as a link farm, and penalise you for it.
But generally speaking, outgoing links to useful sites are a positive, rather than a negative thing.
if they know howâŚor remember each time.
wait iâve read all of the zero evidence you have given to support your position and now realise you are right. Iâll drop Hotmail an email to let them know they are doing it wrong as links in emails open in a new tab. thanks
end.
Unfortunately, if they donât know, then there is every chance that they will expect a link to open in the same tab, and expect the back button to be the way to return to where they were. If a site opens in a new tab and they donât realise, they will be bewildered as to why the back button no longer functions.
Emails are not web pages - the rules are completely different. Most email programs canât display web pages and so opening a web browser and displaying the page there when you click a link in an email is expected behaviour for emails. Webmail simply duplicates email program functionality - it is expected for emails but NOT for web pages.
Hotmail does not have their inbox, draft, send etc links open in a new tab as they should according to your rules as those are web page links not email links.
How many web pages do you have on your site? If I navigate through twenty pages do the links open 20 separate tabs? If not then you are contradicting yourself.
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