For some reason, after I browse for a while using Internet Explorer (version 5), the “Back” button starts acting up. After I browse for a length of time (that appears to be random), the back button begins to only allow me to move back one page. I could click five links through into a site, and be unable to move back to the front page, with IE only remembering the page immediately prior. Sometimes this freak glitch disables the back button altogether! The only way to fix this glitch is to exit IE and start it again.
Netscape never seems to have this problem with losing browsing memory. I believe I can surf about forty sites before the back button begins to forget, but it doesn’t forget every single site I surfed. Just the forty-first. (No buffer should be infinite, I understand).
This is not a problem with the history file. It remembers every site I visited over a month. It’s just a irritating back button glitch in IE.
What is causing it?
Can I fix it?
Do I have to download a new version of IE?
And please don’t tell me I have to upgrade from Win 95 to 98 or ME. I don’t want to encourage Microsoft to make shoddy products!
It could be a glitch in IE (about which I can’t help, sorry) but it’s also worth remembering that some web sites disable the back button to stop you leaving so easily. Pretty unscrupulous but it does happen.
To elaborate on that, the commands that disable the back button on these web pages may be specific to IE, thus the reason you don’t have the same problem with Netscape. In this case, it wouldn’t be a glitch in IE, but a “feature”.
Does [alt <-] also get disabled? That’s what I usually use anyway since my fingers are already on the keyboard & don’t feel like reaching for the mouse most of the time.
I use Win95 & IE5 also, & have never had this trouble.
If one of the pages that you are in automatically refers you to another page, it can seem like it keeps sending you to the page you are trying to leave. The sequence goes like this: go to referring page which sends you right to page A. Click a link on page A that takes you to page B. Click back button to get back to page A. Click back button again, but it goes to the refering page that sends you right to page A. Click back button again, but it sends you to refering page that sends you right to page A…ad nauseum.
Can you right click on the back button and see a list of the last 5 or so pages you have visited? If you can, try clicking on one a couple of places down the list.
Forget the back button. Click on that little itty bitty arrow next to the back button then you can find the page. Or click on the arrow on the right side of the URL window, that too, does the trick.
When your history gets full (Seems like you set a very short history), it won’t keep pages in the back buttons thingys anymore. Plus as the user said, some pages don’t reference a back button at all.
As much as I am inclined to believe that, I doubt that, and I’ll tell you why below.
I managed to have a convoluted explanation as to why I don’t believe the page itself was the problem, but I managed to have it erased by the ESC button. (Maybe I should type this out in WordPerfect first.) I’ll just go to the dramatazation first, since that might make it more clear than my ill constructed prose.
[ol]
[li]Start at Washington Post home page.[/li][li]Click on Entertainment[/li][li]Click on Movies[/li][li]I decide to check out a review (Click on Bruce’s brooding head)[/li][li]On the ‘Unbreakable’ page, I click on the review icon (green light)[/li][li]Read review, lets back out (Click on back drop-down [the itty bitty arrow]. It lists: Unbreakable, Movies, Entertainment, Wash Post[sup]1[/sup]. So far it works)[/li][li]Use back drop down to select “Movies”[/li][li]Click on Comics ( a slight redirect )[/li][li]Click on Boondocks[/li][li]Click on Liberty Meadows[/li][li]Click on Doonebury[/li][li]Click on back button 3 times (still works)[/li][li]Click on Oliphant[/li][li]Click on Ted Rall[/li][li]Select date from drop-down list at random[/li][li]Click on Bill Deore[/li][li]Click on Tom the Dancing Bug[/li][li]Compare Tom to Ted (click back drop-down, select 4th entry)[/li][li]Now at Ted Rall (today’s) click Forward button[/li][li]At Ted Rall’s random strip, Click forward again.[/li][li]At Bill Deore’s strip, notice that Forward button is now disabled (shouldn’t be, Tom should be next.)[/li][li]Click Back drop-down, it lists one site (Ted Rall)[/li][li]Click on Rall from drop-down[/li][li]Back button disabled, Click Forward drop-down (lists only Deore)[/li][li]Click outside drop-down (to cancel request)[/li][li]Click “Back to Comics Page”[/li][li]Click Sports[/li][li]Click “Redskins”[/li][li]check Back drop-down, lists only “Sports” Arrgh!![/li][/ol]
And that ladies and gentlemen is the problem. The irritating things is that I can quit the browser, reopen it do the same sequence of clicks and have the problem not appear. It appears dependent on how long I’ve browsed in one screen, but I’m not sure. It doesn’t affect the history cache (which I have set for 28 days. I have not browsed for 28 days straight). And it irritates me to no end! What is going on?
And in a cruel display of irony, during the creation of the above post, IE did it again!
I made the post, I push the preview button, I make a slight change to post, I click submit, I let the vB redirect me to the thread page. Then I click Back (redirect page), Back (message box page with preview) and then the Back button disables itself!. I Click the forward drop down to det me back to the thread and now both the Forward and Back buttons are disabled. On the new message composition page (I clicked “Reply to Topic”) I go to check how many pages are listed in the back button (should be seven. “Front Page”, GQ, This thread, Reply window, Reply window w/ preview, redirect, thread w/ my reply.) It only lists one (Thread w/ my reply)! Now I have to restart the brower again!