Bug? Using "<a href target=..."

  • Thread starter Thread starter Russell Glasser
  • Start date Start date
R

Russell Glasser

This is driving me crazy, not just because I can't figure out how to
fix this problem, but also because I can't seem to track down an
answer anywhere on Usenet either.

Here's a one line HTML page that I wrote to isolate the problem.

mytest.html:

-----
<a href="mytest2.html" target="newwindow">Click here!</a>
-----


How would you expect this to work? If you click the link once, it
should pop up a new window containing "mytest2.html". If you click it
a second time, it should reload mytest2 in the same window, because
it's a named window that already exists. Right?

On most browsers and most platforms, this works fine. However, on one
of my coworkers' Windows 2000 box running IE6, it opens up a new
window each time you click. I want the target to open in the same
window each time, and it's not.

This does not happen on my IE6, which is also running on Win2K. Could
it possibly be something in the browser settings?
 
on one of my coworkers' Windows 2000 box running IE6,
it opens up a new window each time you click
Click to expand...

Did you experiment with the setting
Reuse windows for launching shortcuts
(Options, Advanced tab, Browsing section
may required restart to take effect)

The F1 help for that option makes it look as if it shouldn't have any
effect on your case but it is obviously closely related and is frequently
suggested in similar discussions.

Also in case this case is being presented as a challenge to you
be aware that some customization can be done using the Folders
File Types Control Panel applet which might cause this effect.
Doing an IE Repair would undo that. Even if you don't have the
option available via the normal Control Panel route you should be able
to Run... (e.g. press Win-R and enter:)

rundll32 setupwbv.dll,IE6Maintenance

Note: the entry point name is case sensitive. A successful repair will
result in a reboot so you might as well close everything before starting it.

A subset of the re-registrations done by that is given in Method 1 of

<title>KB831429 - Windows XP stops responding when you download updates from Windows Update</title>

In view of the fact that a real IE Repair is done during the boot
while nothing else is running it seems prudent to me to quiesce your
system at least (e.g. make sure iexplore.exe and msimn.exe are not
active processes). You could probably kill explorer.exe and do it from
cmd.exe too but that may be carrying things unnecessarily too far.

If I had to guess at one re-registration which could fix the symptom
I would try:

regsvr32 /i shdocvw.dll


HTH

Robert Aldwinckle
 
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