'Back Button (Arrow)' Puzzle ?

[Mel Smith]

Hi:

Enviro: IE7, Firefox, Chrome, Opera, Safari browsing my own website
(mesaeastpark.com) and its real estate listings.

As a newbie, I've been fussing over the last day or so about an annoying
characteristic of the 'Back Button' of the above browsers.

On some *external* sites I visit (from one of my pages on my own site),
my 'back button' fails to return me to the previous page. When I press this
button, the current page reloads again, and again. This is highly annoying
to me (and to my visitors).

After puzzling over this problem all morning, it seems that the
visitation to 'some' external sites leads to a *further* leap by that site
to a further page (which contains the ultimate info desired). However,
*now* the back button returns to that 'certain' external site and thence to
the detail page again.

Result: I can never get back the my own site again and have to 'X' the
browser.

This happens on all browsers *except* Chrome. What Chrome does under the
above circumstances is return me to the *first* page of my own site !!

Question: Is there any combination of keys that I can press which will take
me back *two* pages in my browsing history ??

(Hope I haven't confused you any more than I am )

Thank you for any guidance offered.

-Mel Smith

********************* Part of the relevant page
*****************************
<!-- This Image element allows Users on IE7 and other browsers to go back to
Previous Page
using the 'Back' Button -->

<div id="homepic">
<img src="http://idxpic6.superlativestudio.com/armls/93/4347693_1.jpg"
alt="No Thumbnail Picture Available"
align="top" width="450" height="300" border="2" />
</div>

<-- The Next Image element will NOT let the user move back to the Previous
Page
using the 'Back' Button. Why not ?? -->
<-- This listing is an Exclusive one: X007231 (near bottom of left
column)-->

<div id="homepic">
<img src="http://idxpic6.superlativestudio.com/armls/27/4306527_1.jpg"
alt="No Thumbnail Picture Available"
align="top" width="450" height="300" border="2" />
</div>

**************************************************************

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

Enviro: IE7, Firefox, Chrome, Opera, Safari browsing my own website
(http://mesaeastpark.com) and its real estate listings.

As a newbie, I've been fussing over the last day or so about an
annoying characteristic of the 'Back Button' of the above browsers.

On some *external* sites I visit (from one of my pages on my own
site), my 'back button' fails to return me to the previous page. When
I press this button, the current page reloads again, and again. This
is highly annoying to me (and to my visitors).

After a quick glance, I'd guess that your Back button problem is due to
the fact that your entire site is enclosed in frames.

Where is there a link to an "external site?"

My default text size is apparently larger than yours. Those two buttons
(Login for Directory and Click to Visit Us) are on top of, and obscuring
the content, and the text in the Latest News & Events escapes its yellow
box. Most of that is due to your overuse of "position: absolute" and
exact pixel sizing. That never works.

Test it yourself by upping the text size (but not zoom the whole page.

 

[Rob W.]

Op 26-7-2010 18:35, Beauregard T. Shagnasty schreef:

After a quick glance, I'd guess that your Back button problem is due to
the fact that your entire site is enclosed in frames.

Where is there a link to an "external site?"

My default text size is apparently larger than yours. Those two buttons
(Login for Directory and Click to Visit Us) are on top of, and obscuring
the content, and the text in the Latest News& Events escapes its yellow
box. Most of that is due to your overuse of "position: absolute" and
exact pixel sizing. That never works.

Test it yourself by upping the text size (but not zoom the whole page.

I fail to see how OP's problem has anything to do with his own site
usi8ng frames.

Have you never experienced the same problem
that you visit a site and while there you can't get back to where you
came from?


Let me quote the W3C-site:

<quote>
you should not use "refresh" techniques like :

<META HTTP-EQUIV=REFRESH CONTENT="1; URL=http://www.example.org/bar">.

Why? because it could break the "back" button. Imagine that the user
presses the "back" button, the refresh would work again, and the user
would bounce forward. The user will most likely get very annoyed, and
close the window, which is probably not what you, as the author of this
page, want.
<unquote>

See <http://www.w3.org/QA/Tips/reback>

Seems to me this is the kind of problem Mel Smith got into.

 

[123Jim]

Hi:

Enviro: IE7, Firefox, Chrome, Opera, Safari browsing my own website
(mesaeastpark.com) and its real estate listings.

As a newbie, I've been fussing over the last day or so about an
annoying characteristic of the 'Back Button' of the above browsers.

On some *external* sites I visit (from one of my pages on my own site),
my 'back button' fails to return me to the previous page. When I press
this button, the current page reloads again, and again. This is highly
annoying to me (and to my visitors).

After puzzling over this problem all morning, it seems that the
visitation to 'some' external sites leads to a *further* leap by that site
to a further page (which contains the ultimate info desired). However,
*now* the back button returns to that 'certain' external site and thence
to the detail page again.

Result: I can never get back the my own site again and have to 'X' the
browser.

This happens on all browsers *except* Chrome. What Chrome does under
the above circumstances is return me to the *first* page of my own site !!

Question: Is there any combination of keys that I can press which will
take me back *two* pages in my browsing history ??

(Hope I haven't confused you any more than I am )

Thank you for any guidance offered.

-Mel Smith

********************* Part of the relevant page
*****************************
<!-- This Image element allows Users on IE7 and other browsers to go back
to Previous Page
using the 'Back' Button -->

<div id="homepic">
<img src="http://idxpic6.superlativestudio.com/armls/93/4347693_1.jpg"
alt="No Thumbnail Picture Available"
align="top" width="450" height="300" border="2" />
</div>

<-- The Next Image element will NOT let the user move back to the Previous
Page
using the 'Back' Button. Why not ?? -->
<-- This listing is an Exclusive one: X007231 (near bottom of left
column)-->

<div id="homepic">
<img src="http://idxpic6.superlativestudio.com/armls/27/4306527_1.jpg"
alt="No Thumbnail Picture Available"
align="top" width="450" height="300" border="2" />
</div>

**************************************************************

seems to work fine in FF here ,, can't find the problem

 

[Mel Smith]

Beauregard said:

After a quick glance, I'd guess that your Back button problem is due to
the fact that your entire site is enclosed in frames.

Most of the external sites work properly -- so Frame use should not be
the problem.
Also, I use zoneedit.com for translating my site from
www.mesaeastpark.com to ww2.mesaeastpark.com:4296.

My pages have *no frames* (I don't even know how to *make* a frame --
yet ) )

Where is there a link to an "external site?"

Arggg. I copied faulty code from my pages (I copied the .jpg image
rather than the link). Here is the proper code:

<a

My default text size is apparently larger than yours. Those two buttons
(Login for Directory and Click to Visit Us) are on top of, and obscuring
the content, and the text in the Latest News & Events escapes its yellow
box. Most of that is due to your overuse of "position: absolute" and
exact pixel sizing. That never works.

Test it yourself by upping the text size (but not zoom the whole page.

I use position:absolute *under* a container with position:relative. I
think I have to do this for absolute width reasons -- but my head is
exploding so I'll have to think about it.

Anyway, I'll certainly test using a larger text size and try to learn
more about getting rid of exact pixel sizing. But, I'm more than a bit
overwhelmed now.

Thanks for the comments !

-Mel Smith

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

Beauregard T. Shagnasty schreef:

Perhaps if Mel answers this question, we will be able to make a better
guess...

I fail to see how OP's problem has anything to do with his own site
usi8ng frames.

Until we see the "external site" we don't know.

 

[Mel Smith]

Rob said:

Let me quote the W3C-site:

<quote>
you should not use "refresh" techniques like :

<META HTTP-EQUIV=REFRESH CONTENT="1; URL=http://www.example.org/bar">.

Why? because it could break the "back" button. Imagine that the user
presses the "back" button, the refresh would work again, and the user
would bounce forward. The user will most likely get very annoyed, and
close the window, which is probably not what you, as the author of this
page, want.
<unquote>

See <http://www.w3.org/QA/Tips/reback>

Seems to me this is the kind of problem Mel Smith got into.

Rob:

Thanks for explaining this to me. I answered bts' email and admitted
that I used wrong 'external link' code and gave him the proper one.

Here is the proper 'external link' that doesn't allow the Back button to
work.

<a
href="http://www.flexmls.com/cgi-bin/main...blic_link_tech_id=rjr0to90vfa&s=12&id=1&cid=1">X007231</a>


But, bts raised some other issues (on front size text size) that further
concern me. I'll have to get to work on them too. He told me how to view my
sins.

Thanks,

-Mel Smith

 

[123Jim]

seems to work fine in FF here ,, can't find the problem

aha .. but does not work in IE
I see that the last click .. this one:
"Click to see Details/Pictures on Exclusive ID No. : X007231"
..... breaks out of your frame in IE .. and you can never return ..

It ends up on this external page:
http://www.flexmls.com/cgi-bin/main...blic_link_tech_id=rjr0to90vfa&s=12&id=1&cid=1

Not sure what the solution is .. but since the whole show is controlled
server side by cgi-bin/mep/mepinit.exe .. you might able to reprogram it to
force the external pages to stay in your frame.

 

[Mel Smith]

My default text size is apparently larger than yours. Those two buttons
(Login for Directory and Click to Visit Us) are on top of, and obscuring
the content, and the text in the Latest News & Events escapes its yellow
box. Most of that is due to your overuse of "position: absolute" and
exact pixel sizing. That never works.

Test it yourself by upping the text size (but not zoom the whole page.

Beau:

I tested with a 'larger' and 'largest' text size on IE7 and the 'Login
and Click to Visit Us' still were well within their box. However, The Latest
News and Events were definitely *out of bounds*.

I'll now try the same test with the other browsers.

Thanks for the pointer !

-Mel Smith

 

[Mel Smith]

I said :

I tested with a 'larger' and 'largest' text size on IE7 and the 'Login
and Click to Visit Us' still were well within their box. However, The
Latest News and Events were definitely *out of bounds*.

I'll now try the same test with the other browsers.

Hi all:

I tested with the other browsers:

As Beau says, any size larger that normal starts the disruption of my
pathetic pages.

Back to the books.

Thanks everyone !

-Mel Smith
(alone and old)

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

Beauregard said:

Most of the external sites work properly -- so Frame use should not
be the problem. Also, I use zoneedit.com for translating my site from
www.mesaeastpark.com to ww2.mesaeastpark.com:4296.

My pages have *no frames* (I don't even know how to *make* a frame --
yet ) )

Your entire site is inside a frameset -- it is generally called a
"stealth frame" so that you can use your domain name instead of that ww2
URL.

Arggg. I copied faulty code from my pages (I copied the .jpg image
rather than the link). Here is the proper code:

Where - on your site - is there a link to this external site?

<a
href="http://www.flexmls.com/cgi-bin/main...blic_link_tech_id=rjr0to90vfa&s=12&id=1&cid=1">X007231</a>

That page does not have the "Refresh" that Rob W. was so sure was the
answer. The real answer is that flexmls site uses a *frame-busting*
JavaScript script.

var win = window;
while( parent !== win && (parent.frames.length > 0) )
win = win.parent;

if( window !== win )
win.location = window.location;

I use a similar script on all my sites/pages as well. I don't
particularly care to be buried within someone else's site, implying that
the content belongs to them. So unless your own visitors have disabled
JavaScript, they will leave your frame -- and your Back button.

For external links on my sites, here's my technique:
http://tekrider.net/pages/faq.php?q=osl
which, though it doesn't mention frames, is the same principle.

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

.. you might able to reprogram it to force the external pages to stay
in your frame.

... only if he found a way to disable JavaScript in all his visitors'
browsers... which isn't possible.

 

[123Jim]

.. only if he found a way to disable JavaScript in all his visitors'
browsers... which isn't possible.

--

I always knew javascript was evil! .. I have it turned off with Noscript in
FF .. that is why I found no problems before I used IE.

On the other hand .. might it be possible to scrape the offending web page
containing the frame busting javascript, and paste the relevant bit back
into the frame .... in that way there will be no escape from the frame ... I
dont think javascript can do that client side but some php or other server
side script can I'm sure ...

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

I always knew javascript was evil!

Can be sometimes ... but normally, it is _frames_ that are evil!
http://www.html-faq.com/htmlframes/?framesareevil

The part that causes me to use the framebusting script is:
"Linking and copyright"

.. I have it turned off with Noscript in FF .. that is why I found no
problems before I used IE.

Yes, that would be the case. In Firefox, I use the PrefBar extension to
place a checkbox for JavaScript (and other things) right there in front
of me, and only enable it if i) I trust the site, and ii) there's no
other way to get the content I desire.

On the other hand .. might it be possible to scrape the offending web
page containing the frame busting javascript, and paste the relevant
bit back into the frame .... in that way there will be no escape from
the frame ... I dont think javascript can do that client side but
some php or other server side script can I'm sure ...

I suppose that could be possible, but I don't have any experience
attempting to do so. I wouldn't do it, because it violates the copyright
that I mentioned above.

 

[Doug Miller]

Here is the proper 'external link' that doesn't allow the Back button to
work.

<a
href="http://www.flexmls.com/cgi-bin/mainmenu.cgi?cmd=url+other/run_public_link
.html&public_link_tech_id=rjr0to90vfa&s=12&id=1&cid=1">X007231</a>

Works just great for me; ergo, there's some problem on your site...

 

[123Jim]

Can be sometimes ... but normally, it is _frames_ that are evil!
http://www.html-faq.com/htmlframes/?framesareevil

The part that causes me to use the framebusting script is:
"Linking and copyright"


Yes, that would be the case. In Firefox, I use the PrefBar extension to
place a checkbox for JavaScript (and other things) right there in front
of me, and only enable it if i) I trust the site, and ii) there's no
other way to get the content I desire.


I suppose that could be possible, but I don't have any experience
attempting to do so. I wouldn't do it, because it violates the copyright
that I mentioned above.

--

^^ Good points .. ^^

I think something has changed on the OP's website, or maybe even the linked
webpage as the back button now seems to work fine in IE ..

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

Works just great for me; ergo, there's some problem on your site...

The flexmls link just above works fine, by itself. The problem occurs
when it is clicked on Mel's page (within his frame) and the flexmls
frame-busting script is run. You have to run it from within a frame to
notice this.

I can't find this link on Mel's site ...

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

Beau says:

[Doug wrote:]

Works just great for me; ergo, there's some problem on your site...

The flexmls link just above works fine, by itself. The problem
occurs when it is clicked on Mel's page (within his frame) and the
flexmls frame-busting script is run. You have to run it from within
a frame to notice this.

I can't find this link on Mel's site ...

Beau and Others:

Here's the way to drill down to the offending 'back button':

- http://ww2.mesaeastpark.com:4296

Using this *real* URL (ww2.mesaeastpark.com:4296) negates the problem.
There's no longer a frame to bust out of. Go to http://mesaeastpark.com
and do the rest.

- Click on 'Visit Us'
- Click on 'Real Estate Services'
- Click on 'View Homes for Sale'
- Scroll down the left-hand column (under Sandy's Listings) until you
come to an *Exclusive* Listing (and button) (e.g.,'Exclusive: X007241')
- Click on that button.
- Click on the 'X007241' button on the next page to see the home
detail and pictures.
- Then try to 'back up' with the 'Back Button'

Jeez, I'm sick of this 'drilling down' !!

If you didn't use frames, you could have given a link directly to the
X007241 page. No drilling required.

 

[Mel Smith]

Beau said:

Using this *real* URL (ww2.mesaeastpark.com:4296) negates the problem.
There's no longer a frame to bust out of. Go to http://mesaeastpark.com
and do the rest.


If you didn't use frames, you could have given a link directly to the
X007241 page. No drilling required.

Beau:

Thanks for the clarification and the guidance on your webpage about
visiting external sites.

*Many* years ago, I live north across the *big* lake well north of you
(i.e., in Picton)

Again, many thanks !

-Mel Smith

 

[Dave]

Enviro: IE7, Firefox, Chrome, Opera, Safari browsing my own website
(mesaeastpark.com) and its real estate listings.

As a newbie, I've been fussing over the last day or so about an annoying
characteristic of the 'Back Button' of the above browsers.
On some *external* sites I visit (from one of my pages on my own site),
my 'back button' fails to return me to the previous page. When I press this
button, the current page reloads again, and again. This is highly annoying
to me (and to my visitors).
After puzzling over this problem all morning, it seems that the
visitation to 'some' external sites leads to a *further* leap by that site
to a further page (which contains the ultimate info desired). However,
*now* the back button returns to that 'certain' external site and thence to
the detail page again.

Result: I can never get back the my own site again and have to 'X' the
browser.

Terrible frame designs notwithstanding, you do realise that your back
button also acts as a dropdown allowing you to go back several pages in
one go?

No need to close the browser/window !

(At least it does by default in IE and Firefox, and can be made to do so
in Opera. No idea about Safari/Chrome).