Develop Reference

window.open affect web page

I have a link that opens a new window using window.open. The pop up works fine, however the normal web page stops loading objects (images, scripts, ajax scripts) and sometimes the page doesn't load at all.
Here is my code:
MyWindow=window.open('player.php','Player','width=500','height=300'); return false;
Is there anything I am doing wrong?
Thanks,
Peter

First of all, please be more specific: tell us more about your browser and which version, and possible your OS. It could be more related to the browser than to the web content.
Then on to the possible problem; you start with saying "I have a link that ...".
To me that sound like you use <a href="javascript:DoSomething()">. Or perhaps <a href="#" onclick="DoSomething()">.
I tried both in some modern browsers: Chrome v37, IE v11. Both browsers did not produce what you describe:
- Chrome v37 will happily keep on loading, even if I immediately click a "window.open()"-link on top of a (huge) webpage;
- IE v11 will someshow show "false", which is strange, but still not what you got.
In some cases I also got to deal with the popup blocker.
A general tip might be to NOT USE <a href> for things like this. Behaviour seems inconsistent across browsers, also these days there are better alternatives, such as <span onclick="">...</span> and <button onclick="">...<button> or by using JQuery or other frameworks (which I do not know much about).
Although this many not be a conclusive answer, maybe this can help you experiment on your own, and think about possible causes or alternative ways of doing things.

The behaviour you describe should definitely NOT normally happen. This is confirmed by robbmj's JSFiddle, that fails to reproduce the problem. That's evidence that something is going on in the main page that is not plain vanilla page loading, or your "link opening" has something unusual to it. Apart from the syntax error (you use four parameters, not three).
Since you do not supply information on either of these points (how do you load the main page? How do you trigger the popup-opening code?), we do not even know if the problem
might be browser-related; I'd start and try to test things in IE, Chrome and Mozilla to see
whether anything changes; this might provide some useful insights.
One possibility
A very strong possibility is that your inadvertent fourth parameter goes into the window.open() "replace" parameter, which is a boolean, and triggers undefined behaviour or simply an error that stops everything. You should have things somewhat working in IE and not working at all in Firefox.
You should also be able to see whether this is the case by using Firefox and the Firebug extension, or the Web Developer Console in Chrome.
Another possibility
A more esoteric possibility is that the way you define the link might make the browser believe you've actually moved on to another page, so that there's no point in continuing loading the current page. Depending on the browser, this might have to do with how the link is defined and could be remedied by defining it some other way.
For example it could conceivably happen if you had
...
which I suspect is what led user Tomzan to ask, "is the link something like javascript:...?"
So if this is the case, try with this instead (this works for me in IE9/Chrome/FF):
link
function openPopup() {
MyWindow = window.open('player.php', 'Player', 'width=500, height=300');
// Also try the following. You won't probably like the results (it should send the
// popup window behind), but if it works, it proves we're dealing with a browser
// issue there.
// Blur and refocus
// MyWindow.blur();
// window.focus();
// Just focus
// window.focus();
return false;
}
Workaround
A possibly acceptable workaround could be to disable the link altogether (or hide it via CSS), and only reactivate/show it upon main document being ready. This sidesteps the problem, even if user experience could be somewhat worse due to a longer wait.
But if it's so likely that a user clicks on the link before waiting for the whole page to load, I'd also consider not automatically loading the rest of the page at all, and reorganize information to provide a more streamlined navigation. Or maybe distribute it on two sequential pages. Again, unfortunately you did not supply enough information to do more than guess.

As you probably know, JavaScript is single threaded. Every event is queued until there is idle time for it to be executed.
In the case of window.open, both windows must share a single context to keep it thread-safe because the opened window can access to it's parent using window.opener.
I don't know how browsers implements it, but we can guess two possibilities:
Idle time is shared between the two windows. It means if the popup does many blocking statements, it can freeze the main window's events.
Only one of the two windows can be active, which depends on which one has the focus. In that case, all events may be paused in the main window when you're using the popup.
If you want a more precise answer, I need more details about your code.

document.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded", function () {
//whatever the code
MyWindow=window.open('player.php','Player','width=500','height=300'); return false;
}, false);

Try to wrap the code in SetTimeout
setTimeout(function () {
window.open( .. )
}, 0);

Your document should be loaded first, then popup should be open, So write your javascript code in the scope of $(document).ready().
enter code here
$(document).ready(function(){
$("#clickme").click(function(e){
MyWindow=window.open('player.php','Player','width=500','height=300'); return false;
});
});

AngularJS: How to open a file in a new tab?

LIVE DEMO
Given a URI of a file, I'd like to open it in a new tab (not a new window).
It looks like it is not possible to use $window.open(uri, '_blank').
So, I tried the following trick:
var link = angular.element('');
angular.element(document.body).append(link);
link[0].click();
link.remove();
and it works.
But, if I put exactly the same code in a promise callback, it doesn't work anymore (it opens the file in a new window instead).
Any idea what's going on here?
PLAYGROUND HERE

From your code/content, you can't force the browser to open a new tab (rather than a new window, or vice-versa). It's up to the browser settings to force it one way or another.
Anything else would be a security risk.

Let us understand fundamental how pop up blocker work.
If user trigger the function to open a new url, then pop up blocker will allow it(it should applied to any modern browser - at least firefox, chrome)
If not from user (like javascript function in background, promise or any other function trigger not from user), browser will block unless user whitelist the site manually.
This is not working.
function openInNewTab() {
window.open('http://stackoverflow.com','_blank');
}
openInNewTab();//fail
This is working
<h1><button onclick="openInNewTab()">Open In New Tab - working</button></h1>
I created simple plunkr version - http://plnkr.co/edit/QqsEzMtG5oawZsQq0XBV?p=preview
So, to answer your question. It is impossible unless user authorize it (user trigger it or white listed the site).
Quote from firefox -
Pop-up windows, or pop-ups, are windows that appear automatically
without your permission.
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/pop-blocker-settings-exceptions-troubleshooting
*Open in new tab / new windows not make any difference. Pop up blocker will still always block. It doesn't means that browser will allow if open in new tab. It is just coincidentally for certain browser default the settings in that manner.
Workaround
You can ask user explicitly to trigger the function to open in new tab after the background execution.
You can display message in UI to ask user to open the url.
Example - http://plnkr.co/edit/iyNzpg64DtsrijAGbHlT?p=preview

You can only open new windows inside click event handlers fired by the user.
The reason for this is usability.
I'm not sure if all browsers have this behavior but some browsers do not allow scripts to open windows without the user being noticed. Imagine when you visit a web page and suddenly, the web page opens several windows => it's annoying.
See this DEMO (tested with my Chrome and Firefox), even we trigger click event by script, the browser still blocks the popup.
$("#test").click(function(){
openInNewTab();
});
$("#test").click();
You cannot open a new window inside your ajax success callback because your ajax success is run in another cycle after the click event handler has finished its execution.
See this link for a workaround
if I put exactly the same code in a promise callback, it doesn't work
anymore (it opens the file in a new window instead).
I'm surprised that you're still able to open a new window. But this problem really has a lot of things to do with click events fired by the user.

Your problem is two-fold, and both folds tread on uncertain territory.
In the old days of browsers, window.open did exactly that – open a new window. That's because the concept of tabs hadn't been invented yet. When tabs were introduced, they were treated exactly like windows to improve compatibility, and that tradition continues to this day. That, and the fact that window.open was only standardized very recently, means that JavaScript cannot distinguish between windows and tabs.
There is no "normal" way to specify whether a link should open in a new tab or not. You can use the following hack, though: specify a custom window size to the open call (via the third argument), like so:
window.open('http://example.com', '', 'width=' + screen.width);
This will cause almost all browsers to open a separate window because tabs cannot have custom sizes.
In JavaScript, there are trusted events and untrusted events. Trusted events are, for example, legitimate clicks on a link by the user, whereas an untrusted event would be a manual click() call on a link.
Only trusted event handlers may open new windows/tabs. This is to prevent client-side attacks that crash the browser or confuse a user by rapidly opening a hundred tabs on mouseover or something similar.
Your second example doesn't work because the popup blocker blocks the untrusted event that you triggered via the click(). Although it was caused by a real click, the asynchronous call in-between severs the link to trustedness.

working version
$http.get('https://api.github.com/users/angular').then(openInNewTab());
EDIT----------------
Do not know why but a click() method called from a callback function acts differently than calling it straight.
You can see it here with a set interval example.
That is why I had call the function directly rather than going through a callback.
see it with timer callback

or you can use $window service please see here : http://plnkr.co/edit/8egebfFj4T3LwM0Kd64s?p=preview
angular.module("Demo", []).controller("DemoCtrl", function($scope, $http, $window) {
$scope.uri = 'http://martinfowler.com/ieeeSoftware/whenType.pdf';
function openInNewTab() {
var link = angular.element('');
angular.element(document.body).append(link);
link[0].click();
link.remove();
}
$scope.works = openInNewTab;
$scope.doesntWork = function() {
$http.get('https://api.github.com/users/angular').then($window.open($scope.uri));
};
});

For us the following worked well: http://blog-it.hypoport.de/2014/08/19/how-to-open-async-calls-in-a-new-tab-instead-of-new-window-within-an-angularjs-app/
In short: We remember the reference to the new window and changing the location afterwards.

Waiting event before closing window using onbeforeunload

Context :
I have developped an application which require authentification. This application uses events for dialoging with a server. When the server answer, some events are send to the client (UI).
Problem :
When the user close the page, it is necessary to make a logout on the server. With my architecture, it's easy to call a method which perform this logout. But i would like that the user show the logout progress before closing the webpage. In fact, i would like to close the webpage only when a specific event (for example : disconnection_success), is well received.
Moreover, it's verry important to not launcg another webpage because event is received on the first webpage when the logout is successfull. (Because dialog is done throw XMLHttpRequest)
Test :
I already do some test using onbeforeunload but it seems that is difficult to customize the popup.
Do you have some ideas to resolve the problem ?
BR

There are some issues with this, but you're on the right track. You're right in that you should use onbeforeunload because it is the only event that you can have triggered upon the closing of the browser window. (I know you can use onunload but at that point you have no time to do anything.) The issue here is how much code do you want to execute. The onbeforeunload doesn't allow you much time before it starts to unload the page.
BTW, there are two different scenarios with onbeforeunload:
If you return a string inside the onbeforeunload event, it creates the pop-up that you were referring to. The issue here is that with the pop-up, you won't have enough time to execute code
The other option is not returning anything. Instead, call your logout methods. This should give your code enough time to execute before closing
I actually had a question very similar to this and ended up solving it myself: How to logout during onbeforeunload/onunload using Javascript
In your question you state that you want to have a progress bar displayed when they log-out. This is impossible to do when the user closes the browser. At the moment they close their window, you have lost all control, except for in the onbeforeunload (and onunload but don't use this), and that is why your code needs to be executed there. With that being said, you could anchor your logout button (I'm assuming you have one on your application) and have it display the progress bar.
Just think about what could happen if you actually did have that kind of control - where you could pop up windows and progress bars when the user is trying to close their browser window. You could pop up anything and restrict the user from having any reliable functionality. That is why it was programmed that the onbeforeunload (and unload) events are the only ones possible to access the closing of a browser. These events have some pretty strict guidelines to them that prevent any kind of possible mis-use. I understand the problem you're having, I was there and it stinks, but I think that is your only option if you were going to use onbeforeunload.

Unblock window.open pop-up?

Due to the limitations of a really clunky CMS, I am unable to use
target="_blank"
to open links in new windows. So I'm thinking that my only real solution is to point the link at an intermediary page that opens a new window and then redirects the current window back to the originating page... so something like this:
window.open ("http://www.NewPage.com/");
window.location = "http://www.OldPage.com/";
Of course, most browsers will block the window.open method... so what are my options? Surely there's some clever Javascript trickery to get around this.

No options. You can't do it, and for good reason.
Browsers will only allow window.open() to work when the code that calls it is handling an event like "click". In that circumstance, the browser assumes that the page provides a clickable element and that the user knows there'll be a popup. If a page just calls window.open() for a new window from some context like straight script code, or in a "ready" or "load" event handler, or an XMLHttpRequest callback, then the browser assumes the popup may be something obnoxious.
Some browsers allow the user to relax those rules, but your code can't force that.

You can probably just inject an iframe on the page and position it over everything, but I would really not recommend this.
The browser will be in control of whether the window.open is allowed or not at the end of the day so I wouldn't bother trying to find a solution.

window.unbeforeunload show div IE7 problem

Currently I am developing a web application for which I am using a pre-loader icon. What I want is that the pre-loader becomes visible every time the user navigates to another page or refreshes the page. So far I have the following solution:
window.onbeforeunload = function() { $("applicationdisabler").show(); };
For Safari and Firefox it works fine when the user clicks a link or refreshes the page. However in IE7 the div only becomes visible when the user clicks a link and NOT when the user refreshes the page.
The user can refresh the page by hitting F5 (on Windows) or any other possible way the browser provided.
Of course I have been looking for some workarounds already. The following code shows the alert in IE7, but the div still doesn't become visible.
window.onbeforeunload = function() { $("applicationdisabler").show(); alert("come on!"); };
The code of my div:
<div id="applicationdisabler"><img src="images/preloader.gif" /></div>
Hopefully someone can help me out.

You need to put the # before the id on the jQuery selector:
$("#applicationdisabler").show();

Why not use just use the onLoad listener instead? Although it would be slightly slower it should be more reliable.
Actually after a bit of looking around I'm not sure modifying the DOM makes any sense unless the onBeforeUnload handler returns false first - i.e. forces the user to stay on the same page.
As I understand it the onBeforeUnload event is fired just before the page is unloaded, so if you don't return false the browser will unload the page and DOM, and any JavaScript executed after that will be pointless.
That doesn't quite explain why JavaScript isn't executed properly in the onBeforeUnload function, but from what I've seen sites only use the window.alert or window.prompt dialogs to ask the user if they want to leave the site, and then often executing JavaScript if the user decides to stay.
Hence I'm guessing that some browsers may not allow DOM manipulation when this event is fired - since if the page is unloaded any DOM manipulation done is completely pointless.
So either:
Return false in your onBeforeUnload method, and then show your preloader (although this will stop navigation to the next page)
Use the onLoad event of the next page to show the preloader image instead
Also note: Opera versions 9.5 and below do not support this event (I'm unsure about later versions) but GMail does manage to catch the back button in Opera.
Possibly related is this security warning for IE7's implementation of the onBeforeUnload event - it's possible Microsoft patched it in a way that prevents the things you're trying to do. And I know IE6 and below don't allow commands like document.location='' in the onBeforeUnload handler for security reasons.