187195 - when unvisited link becomes visited, href attribute becomes absolute

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Firefox :: General, defect)

Description

[Jesse Ruderman]

Phoenix has a feature that makes links change from the unvisited appearance to
the visited appearance when you middle-click them.  This feature has a
side-affect: the href attribute becomes absolute when a link becomes visited,
confusing my user style sheet and potentially confusing scripts that use
getAttribute("href") [as opposed to foo.href].

This bug doesn't affect links that were already visited before you load a page.
 As a result, reloading fixes the problem.

I discovered this bug shortly after adding the following rule to
userContent.css.  The rule is only supposed to match absolute links to slashdot
urls, but because of this bug, it also matches relative links to slashdot urls
that are visited while the page is open.  The rule doesn't use :link or :visited.

a[href^="http://www.slashdot.org"], a[href^="http://slashdot.org"] 
{ background: white ! important; color: #066 ! important; font-weight: bold !
important }

Comment 1

[Jesse Ruderman]

Attachment: testcase

Comment 2

[David Baron :dbaron: (⌚️UTC-4, no longer working on Mozilla)]

(In reply to comment #0)
> Phoenix has a feature that makes links change from the unvisited appearance to
> the visited appearance when you middle-click them.  This feature has a

It does?  I thought middle-click on a link was either "open in new tab" or "open
in new window".

I see no evidence of this feature you mention still existing, and in any case,
it sounds like a front-end bug (because it sounds like a poor implementation of
the feature in question, if that feature still exists).

Comment 3

[David Tenser [:djst]]

(In reply to comment #2)
> It does?  I thought middle-click on a link was either "open in new tab" or "open
> in new window".
> 
> I see no evidence of this feature you mention still existing, and in any case,
> it sounds like a front-end bug (because it sounds like a poor implementation of
> the feature in question, if that feature still exists).

Just try it, it works. David Hyatt was the one who added this feature, and it's
great. But this bug is about a side-effect that should be fixed, of course.

Comment 4

[David Baron :dbaron: (⌚️UTC-4, no longer working on Mozilla)]

When I middle click a link in Firefox, it opens in a new tab.

Comment 5

[David Tenser [:djst]]

(In reply to comment #4)
> When I middle click a link in Firefox, it opens in a new tab.

Sure, and the link gets the a:visited color instead of a:link.

Comment 6

[David Baron :dbaron: (⌚️UTC-4, no longer working on Mozilla)]

I don't think that's what comment 0 is referring to.  Comment 0 is referring to
a feature that manipulates the DOM in some way.

Comment 7

[David Tenser [:djst]]

(In reply to comment #6)
> I don't think that's what comment 0 is referring to.  Comment 0 is referring to
> a feature that manipulates the DOM in some way.

I am referring to this (in comment 0):
"Phoenix has a feature that makes links change from the unvisited appearance to
the visited appearance when you middle-click them."

That's exactly what I thought we were all talking about here. :)

Comment 8

[David Baron :dbaron: (⌚️UTC-4, no longer working on Mozilla)]

Oh, this was already fixed (and I was right that it was a front-end bug):

http://bonsai.mozilla.org/cvslog.cgi?file=mozilla/browser/base/content/contentAreaUtils.js&rev=1.19#1.19
http://bonsai.mozilla.org/cvsblame.cgi?file=mozilla/browser/base/content/contentAreaUtils.js&rev=1.33&mark=74-75#64

Comment 9

[David Baron :dbaron: (⌚️UTC-4, no longer working on Mozilla)]

(I interpreted comment 0 as saying the feature was:
  middle click link == mark link as visited
.)