69882 - Middle-click on <input type=image> doesn't work, should open in new window

Status: NEW

(SeaMonkey :: UI Design, defect)

Description

[Steevithak]

On the Linux version of Netscape and Mozilla one can normally open a link in a
new window by clicking the link with the center button of the mouse. For some
types of links which are actually <input> buttons, this doesn't work on
Mozilla. The simplest example of this problem that I could find was the
personals section on Yahoo! Each personals ad has a link you click to see the
complete add. With Netscape 4.x on Linux, you can click this link with the
center button and the page opens in a new browser window. But clicking the link
with the center button using Mozilla doesn't work. As you mouse over the button,
the Mozilla cursor changes from an arrow to a finger which seems to indicate
that it's aware of it being a link. On the other hand, right-clicking to bring
up the context menu doesn't offer an "open link in new window" option.

The URL I included above from Yahoo! looks like it may be dynamic - if it
doesn't work, just go to http://personals.yahoo.com/ and then click the "Find my
Match!" button. When you get a page of matches, look for the "More" link at the
end of each ad and try to open it in a new page by either clicking the center
button or right-clicking and using the menu. I'll see if I can track down an
even simpler page that demonstrates the problem...

Comment 1

[Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]]

The links in question are actually <input type="image"> elements.

Interestingly. NS4.x _does_ open the page resulting from the form post on a
middleclick...

Over to XP miscellany.  It would be nice if this were to work as in NS 4.x

Comment 2

[Chris Waterson]

This got put in the wrong component. ben, it probably belongs to you or one of 
your minions.

Comment 3

[timeless]

blake?

Comment 4

[sairuh (rarely reading bugmail)]

yow, when i middle-click the More button in a given ad here, my default home
page loads in the current browser window. [nor does a new browser window open,
for that matter.]

->bill? also cc'ing jag.

Comment 5

[Paul Chen]

Marking nsbeta1+, p3, mozilla0.9, reassigning to mcafee to have a look

Comment 6

[sairuh (rarely reading bugmail)]

could this get fixed by moz0.9.1...?

Comment 7

[Blake Ross]

Taking, if Chris doesn't mind, since I did the other modified click stuff...

I presume this isn't Linux-only?

Comment 8

[Jesse Ruderman]

See also bug 17754, "Submit form in new window" (6 votes, no owner, future).  
Does one of these bugs block the other?

Comment 9

[Blake Ross]

jag, maybe you could just fix this in <browser/> so we don't have to mess with 
contentAreaClick.js.

Comment 10

[Blake Ross]

usability/polish 0.9.4.

Comment 11

[Steve VanDeBogart]

This seems to have worked until recently.  Was it broken again? BUILD 2001101808
URL http://schedule.berkeley.edu/srchsprg.html  Middle clicking 'begin search'
will open home page in current window, or try to open one field of the form as
the url destination.

Comment 12

[Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]]

*** Bug 99537 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 13

[Steevithak]

Is this bug still on the radar (hopefully for 1.0)? I just checked it in 0.9.9
and noticed that a middle-click still brings up the default home page in a new
window instead of the intended page. However, a right click no longer even shows
the "open in window" option like it used to. So it seems this bug has gotten
worse rather than better over time. I didn't realize when I originally reported
it that this was a bug that would require more than a year to solve!

Comment 14

[Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]]

jkeiser, this is the bug I was talking to you about a few weeks back when we 
couldn't figure out a way to post a form to a specified frame short of toggling 
the form's "target" attribute and then handling the fallout....

Comment 15

[John Keiser (jkeiser)]

Fallout?  I can't remember what the fallout is, but it seems like we could make
a method on nsIForm that the image click could call to submit the form with
another target.  This should not be too hard.

Blake, are there any difficult issues with middle-mouse-click or is it just a
matter of handling it in the frame and passing the event?

Comment 16

[Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]]

The fallout was that twiddling the target attr involves setting it back to the 
original value once submission is done or something like that.  And that starts 
to suck a lot if DOM accesses the form while submission is happening, for 
example.

The problem with simply handing this in the frame is that then embedding apps 
get this behavior as well, no?  Does the fact that it's following the middle-
click pref let us get away with it as far as embedding is concerned?

The problem with handling the click in JS (contentAreaClick or in the 
<browser>/<tabbrowser> bindings) and using a method on nsIForm for the 
submission is, of course, that nsIForm is not scriptable.

Comment 17

[Vaclav Dvorak]

How is submitting a form with an image button different from submitting it with
a submit button? In other words, why isn't this a dupe of the (more general) bug
17754, already mentioned in comment 8?

Comment 18

[Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]]

A submit button looks like a submit button and has the submit button cursor.  An
image input looks like a linked image and has the link cursor.  In other words,
it is not at all obvious that an image input will submit a form.

This certainly depends on the back end work needed in bug 17754.

Comment 19

[Steevithak]

Bug 17754 is a request for a new feature to allow forms to be submitted in new
windows. This bug is an actual bug that needs to be fixed and has nothing to do
with submitting forms. Previous versions of Netscape (and some early version of
Mozilla I believe) allowed links of all types to be opened in new windows.
Recent Mozilla versions, however, broke this ability. Some links can still be
opened in new windows but links initiated by javascript actions associated with
page elements (in this case a button on a form) cannot be opened in new windows
anymore.

Comment 20

[Jeremy M. Dolan]

Amazon's "add to wishlist"/etc links cause this. Perhaps this should be escalated?

Comment 21

[Serge Gautherie (:sgautherie)]

Filter "spam" on "guifeatures-nobody-20080610".

Comment 23

[Steevithak]

Wow, funny to suddenly get an email on this bug. Maybe it should just be marked as wontfix given that it's been 15 years with no progress since I filed it. lol :)

Comment 24

[Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]]

I have to assume Patrick just got the wrong bug number here, since the bugs he marked as duplicate and depending on this bug have absolutely nothing to do with it....

Comment 25

[Patrick McManus [:mcmanus]]

yep - missing an '8'. thanks.

Comment 26

[Michael Solomon]

Attachment: same problem

Thanks from puhaverdi1970.