Develop Reference

How to optimize jQuery.getJSON() for geolocalisation

I use jQuery.getJSON() to get location of visitors and based on that location i show/hide a specific div. So because of the server api limit's i want that request to be sent just one time per visitor during his visits, may be using a session or a cache in client side to store that location to be used during his visits ; do you have any suggestion ? or a ready to use implementation ?
<script>
$(function () {
$.getJSON('http://freegeoip.net/json/?callback=?', function (location, textStatus, jqXHR) {
console.log("callback running");
console.log(textStatus);
console.log(jqXHR);
var div = document.getElementById('showadsbayt');
jQuery('#region-name').html(location.country_code );
if (location.country_code != 'MA') {
div.style.display = 'none';
}
});
});
</script>

Multiple choices come to mind depending on how complex your implementation needs to be, how many pages your application has and whether you want to hide the location data from the user or not. I'll just list them briefly below.
Save as global variable
This one is really obvious and I'm just putting it here for the sake of completeness, but it's enough if you're making a single page app.
Append the parts of the location data that interest you as query string
This is probably the easiest solution if your app has multiple pages and all you need to do is persist data across them. This also has the effect of exposing location data to the user, allowing them to for example bookmark or share the page with the given location - something that may or may not be desirable in your use case.
Use cookies
Cookies are meant just for that - keeping key-value pairs on the user's machine for later use. You can simply save the location data as a cookie and later check if that cookie is set. If it is, use the data from the cookie instead of making an API call. This also persists between visits, so if you care about the case when your users may change location, you need to set a low expiry or allow them to reset their location.
Also, if you're in the EU, you need to put the stupid cookie law banner on your app somewhere.
Use localStorage
Same thing as with cookies, except a bit more flexible and doesn't work on Opera Mini. Use this if your location data is huge for some weird reason.
Apparently this also falls under the EU cookie law, so prepare your banners if you go down this road.

using Web Storage , code below will find if the user visit your page or not if not visited ajax will make a request and an expire date will be set and you can change value in days or set 0 to be for ever and sure if visited ajax won't request.
< script >
$(function() {
var expire = 30; //in days ====> 0 == for ever
if (!localStorage["visited"] || (+localStorage["visited"] <= new Date().getTime() && +localStorage["visited"] > 0)) {
localStorage["visited"] = (+expire * 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000) + new Date().getTime();
localStorage["visited"] = expire == 0 ? 0 : localStorage["visited"];
$.getJSON('http://freegeoip.net/json/?callback=?', function(location, textStatus, jqXHR) {
console.log("callback running");
console.log(textStatus);
console.log(jqXHR);
var div = document.getElementById('showadsbayt');
jQuery('#region-name').html(location.country_code);
if (location.country_code != 'MA') {
div.style.display = 'none';
}
});
}
}); < /script>

PHP cookie set to redirect, googlebot redirects too - how to stop this?

When a user hits domain.com for the first time, a cookie is set and they are redirected to domain.com/welcome (which is basically the index but with like an introduction animation that will only show once).
When a user visits the site a second time, it stays on domain.com and doesn't go to domain.com/welcome anymore because the cookie has been set already.
Easy enough. To test it, go to http://lansana.me
The problem is, I blocked /welcome in robots.txt to prevent duplicate pages on search results (because the / and /welcome pages have basically the same content, one is just more animated), but when I try to fetch as google in webmaster tools, it says it was redirected to the /welcome page (obviously). Is there any way I can tell Google not to listen to the code I have that redirects?
Here is my controller in Laravel, setting the cookie and redirecting or staying on the home page (PHP):
public function index()
{
$cookie = 'oreos';
$value = 'redirect';
$expiration = time() + (10 * 365 * 24 * 60 * 60);
$domain = '/';
if (!isset($_COOKIE[$cookie])) {
setcookie($cookie, $value, $expiration, $domain);
$articles = ArticlesModel::latest()->orderBy('created_at', 'desc')->get();
return redirect()->action('ArticlesController#welcome');
}
$articles = ArticlesModel::latest()->orderBy('created_at', 'desc')->get();
return view('pages.index', compact('articles'));
}
public function welcome()
{
$articles = ArticlesModel::latest()->orderBy('created_at', 'desc')->get();
return view('pages.welcome', compact('articles'));
}
Here is the JavaScript that basically does different stuff based on the page (I'm not sure how important this script is to this question):
// IGNORE THIS LINE
if ($(location).attr('pathname') == '/resume') {
.....
// if current page is /
} else if ($(location).attr('pathname') == '/') {
.....
// If current page is /welcome
} else if ($(location).attr('pathname') == '/welcome') {
.....
}
If there's no way to tell googlebot to ignore the index and welcome method and just go to index, is there a better way to achieve what I'm doing that won't conflict with googlebot?

Instead of checking the path in your JavaScript, check the existence of the cookie. The redirect is always bad because its bad for performance and apparently for Google too.
You can also move the cookie creation to JavaScript (or even use a different storage for it) and remove any server side logic for it. I think that this point is especially interesting because your feature is actually only affecting the presentation; why should the server care?

How do you detect and prevent a user from accessing a web app from multiple browser tabs using php/javascript?

I have a web app that I would like to restrict to a single browser tab or window. So the idea is a user logs in and if they open a link in a tab/window or open a new browser tab/window it kills their session. I know many are against this but that's how the app needs to be.
The controller checks if the user is logged in via:
if (!isset($_SESSION['user_logged_in'])) {
Session::destroy();
header('location: '.URL.'login');
}
I have tried setting $_SESSION['user_logged_in'] to false if its true but then obviously you don't go any further than one page.
Is there a way to destroy the session when a new browser tab or window is opened? I'm guessing probably jquery/javascript but not across that side of things.

It's very complex to achieve, unfortunately.
And almost impossible to do it true cross-browser and supported by every browser.
Technically, every new browser tab doesn't differ from the latter, form server's point of view. They share cookies and session too.
The only things that differ is JavaScript session. Say, an example: a site that is fully AJAX-based. First page is always login page. Then everything's changed with AJAX. If you dare to open another tab with this site it will open the first page which is always logging you out be default, for example. This can make it possible, but it's very complex.
New technologies stack like localStorage might make this possible, where you can communicate between tabs sending messages in localStorage. But this isn't fully cross-browser and isn't supported by all browsers versions.
So if you are ok with only limited choice of latest browsers — then dig on localStorage and postMessage.

Just to piggy back on what Oleg said, it would be incredibly difficult since HTTP is stateless and browser tabs share data. One potential way of doing it COULD be on the front end, but a very specific set of circumstances would need to be present and they could easily be bypassed. IF the application is a SPA and the primary body is only loaded once, you could potentially generate a key on the body load and send that with each request. Then, if the body is reloaded (say in a new tab or new window), you could generate a new key which would start a new session.
However, the real question is why you would want to do this. Your user experience will suffer and no real security gains exist.

I have some solution and I want share it with you.
To restrict user to only one tab per session, you may use cookie. I describe here how you may build your webapp in order to archieve that goal.
Each time the web module needs to render the auth/login page, create and store a cookie with a given name. Let's call it browserName. The value of the cookie must be a generated value. You may use java.util.UUID if your programming language is java.
When the browser finished loading your auth/login page, set the browser's name with the generated cookie value. You have to know how to read cookie using JavaScript.
Each time the user load other page than auth/login page, check whether the current browser's name is that one stored in the cookie. If they are differents, prompt user and then you can run a snipt that reset session and redirect to auth/login page.
The following is an example of implementing what I've said.
Snipt to be added in the method that runs before your login page in shown Map<String, Object> v$params = new TreeMap<>();
v$params.put("path", "/");
FacesContext.getCurrentInstance()
.getExternalContext()
.addResponseCookie("browserName", UUID.randomUUID().toString(), v$params);
The mini JavaScript library that help you with cookie and other. Add it globally in your webapp.
/**
* http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5639346/shortest-function-for-reading-a-cookie-in-javascript
*/
(function() {
function readCookie(name, c, C, i) {
if (cookies) {
return cookies[name];
}
c = document.cookie.split('; ');
cookies = {};
for (i = c.length - 1; i >= 0; i--) {
C = c[i].split('=');
cookies[C[0]] = C[1];
}
return cookies[name];
}
window.readCookie = readCookie; // or expose it however you want
})();
// function read_cookie(k,r){return(r=RegExp('(^|;
// )'+encodeURIComponent(k)+'=([^;]*)').exec(document.cookie))?r[2]:null;}
function read_cookie(k) {
return (document.cookie.match('(^|; )' + k + '=([^;]*)') || 0)[2];
}
/**
* To be called in login page only
*/
function setupWebPage(){
window.name = read_cookie("browserName");
}
/**
* To be called in another pages
*/
function checkWebPageSettings(){
var curWinName = window.name;
var setWinName = read_cookie("browserName");
if( curWinName != setWinName){
/**
* You may redirect the user to a proper page telling him that
* your application doesn't support multi tab/window. From this page,
* the user may decide to go back to the previous page ou loggout in
* other to have a new session in the current browser's tab or window
*/
alert('Please go back to your previous page !');
}
}
Add this to your login page <script type="text/javascript">
setupWebPage();
</script>
Add this to your other page template <script type="text/javascript">
checkWebPageSettings();
</script>

Is it possible to know how long a user has spent on a page?

Say I've a browser extension which runs JS pages the user visits.
Is there an "outLoad" event or something of the like to start counting and see how long the user has spent on a page?

I am assuming that your user opens a tab, browses some webpage, then goes to another webpage, comes back to the first tab etc. You want to calculate exact time spent by the user. Also note that a user might open a webpage and keep it running but just go away. Come back an hour later and then once again access the page. You would not want to count the time that he is away from computer as time spent on the webpage. For this, following code does a docus check every 5 minutes. Thus, your actual time might be off by 5 minutes granularity but you can adjust the interval to check focus as per your needs. Also note that a user might just stare at a video for more than 5 minutes in which case the following code will not count that. You would have to run intelligent code that checks if there is a flash running or something.
Here is what I do in the content script (using jQuery):
$(window).on('unload', window_unfocused);
$(window).on("focus", window_focused);
$(window).on("blur", window_unfocused);
setInterval(focus_check, 300 * 1000);
var start_focus_time = undefined;
var last_user_interaction = undefined;
function focus_check() {
if (start_focus_time != undefined) {
var curr_time = new Date();
//Lets just put it for 4.5 minutes
if((curr_time.getTime() - last_user_interaction.getTime()) > (270 * 1000)) {
//No interaction in this tab for last 5 minutes. Probably idle.
window_unfocused();
}
}
}
function window_focused(eo) {
last_user_interaction = new Date();
if (start_focus_time == undefined) {
start_focus_time = new Date();
}
}
function window_unfocused(eo) {
if (start_focus_time != undefined) {
var stop_focus_time = new Date();
var total_focus_time = stop_focus_time.getTime() - start_focus_time.getTime();
start_focus_time = undefined;
var message = {};
message.type = "time_spent";
message.domain = document.domain;
message.time_spent = total_focus_time;
chrome.extension.sendMessage("", message);
}
}

onbeforeunload should fit your request. It fires right before page resources are being unloaded (page closed).

<script type="text/javascript">
function send_data(){
$.ajax({
url:'something.php',
type:'POST',
data:{data to send},
success:function(data){
//get your time in response here
}
});
}
//insert this data in your data base and notice your timestamp
window.onload=function(){ send_data(); }
window.onbeforeunload=function(){ send_data(); }
</script>
Now calculate the difference in your time.you will get the time spent by user on a page.

For those interested, I've put some work into a small JavaScript library that times how long a user interacts with a web page. It has the added benefit of more accurately (not perfectly, though) tracking how long a user is actually interacting with the page. It ignore times that a user switches to different tabs, goes idle, minimizes the browser, etc.
Edit: I have updated the example to include the current API usage.
http://timemejs.com
An example of its usage:
Include in your page:
<script src="http://timemejs.com/timeme.min.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
TimeMe.initialize({
currentPageName: "home-page", // page name
idleTimeoutInSeconds: 15 // time before user considered idle
});
</script>
If you want to report the times yourself to your backend:
xmlhttp=new XMLHttpRequest();
xmlhttp.open("POST","ENTER_URL_HERE",true);
xmlhttp.setRequestHeader("Content-type", "application/x-www-form-urlencoded");
var timeSpentOnPage = TimeMe.getTimeOnCurrentPageInSeconds();
xmlhttp.send(timeSpentOnPage);
TimeMe.js also supports sending timing data via websockets, so you don't have to try to force a full http request into the document.onbeforeunload event.

The start_time is when the user first request the page and you get the end_time by firing an ajax notification to the server just before the user quits the page :
window.onbeforeunload = function () {
// Ajax request to record the page leaving event.
$.ajax({
url: "im_leaving.aspx", cache: false
});
};
also you have to keep the user session alive for users who stays long time on the same page (keep_alive.aspxcan be an empty page) :
var iconn = self.setInterval(
function () {
$.ajax({
url: "keep_alive.aspx", cache: false });
}
,300000
);
then, you can additionally get the time spent on the site, by checking (each time the user leaves a page) if he's navigating to an external page/domain.

Revisiting this question, I know this wouldn't be much help in a Chrome Ext env, but you could just open a websock that does nothing but ping every 1 second and then when the user quits, you know to a precision of 1 second how long they've spent on the site as the connection will die which you can escape however you want.

Try out active-timeout.js. It uses the Visibility API to check when the user has switched to another tab or has minimized the browser window.
With it, you can set up a counter that runs until a predicate function returns a falsy value:
ActiveTimeout.count(function (time) {
// `time` holds the active time passed up to this point.
return true; // runs indefinitely
});

javascript - read a seperate tab to check if it's open

I'm looking for a way to somehow read / check if another browser tab is open before opening the requested tab.
For example:
This is for my traffic exchange site, they just open mysite.com/surf.php and leave it viewing user's submitted sites in a frame. They earn points just for leaving that running.
Now lets say USER A has SURF PAGE A running fine and then opens SURF PAGE B then he has 2 mysite.com/surf.php running and earning double the points everybody else will earn.
What I want to happen is:
USER A has SURF PAGE A running fine and then tries to open SURF PAGE B which will check if another mysite.com/surf.php is already open and if it is to redirect the request for the 2nd surf page to another mysite.com/surf-error.php
So they can only ever have 1 mysite.com/surf.php running at any given time.
How would I go about doing this?

Browser windows on the same domain in the same browser can exchange some information via:
Cookies
Local Storage
Communication with a common server
You can use 1) or 2) to store some information about an active page and refuse to let other pages be active if one is already active.
But, the most reliable way to enforce policies like you are asking about is to use the actual server to enforce it. If users have a login, then code the server to only allow a logged in user to accumulate points for one site at a time.
Other than these options, if you want to enforce it all client-side, you would probably need a browser-plugin that could monitor all open browser windows (which I assume is not practical). You cannot do monitoring of multiple windows opened by the user from plain javascript in a web page.

when you start tracking time for someone set a session variable
session.trackingtime = true
when you check again to start tracking time make sure that value is set to false. When you stop tracking time set the variables to false.

I have done something very similar today. Just update the else if part to do a redirect in your case.
// helper function to set cookies
function setCookie(cname, cvalue, seconds) {
var d = new Date();
d.setTime(d.getTime() + (seconds * 1000));
var expires = "expires="+ d.toUTCString();
document.cookie = cname + "=" + cvalue + ";" + expires + ";path=/";
}
// helper function to get a cookie
function getCookie(cname) {
var name = cname + "=";
var decodedCookie = decodeURIComponent(document.cookie);
var ca = decodedCookie.split(';');
for(var i = 0; i < ca.length; i++) {
var c = ca[i];
while (c.charAt(0) == ' ') {
c = c.substring(1);
}
if (c.indexOf(name) == 0) {
return c.substring(name.length, c.length);
}
}
return "";
}
// Do not allow multiple call center tabs
if (~window.location.hash.indexOf('#admin/callcenter')) {
$(window).on('beforeunload onbeforeunload', function(){
document.cookie = 'ic_window_id=; expires=Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 UTC; path=/;';
});
function validateCallCenterTab() {
var win_id_cookie_duration = 10; // in seconds
if (!window.name) {
window.name = Math.random().toString();
}
if (!getCookie('ic_window_id') || window.name === getCookie('ic_window_id')) {
// This means they are using just one tab. Set/clobber the cookie to prolong the tab's validity.
setCookie('ic_window_id', window.name, win_id_cookie_duration);
} else if (getCookie('ic_window_id') !== window.name) {
// this means another browser tab is open, alert them to close the tabs until there is only one remaining
var message = 'You cannot have this website open in multiple tabs. ' +
'Please close them until there is only one remaining. Thanks!';
$('html').html(message);
clearInterval(callCenterInterval);
throw 'Multiple call center tabs error. Program terminating.';
}
}
callCenterInterval = setInterval(validateCallCenterTab, 3000);
}