Web Browsers/Redirection

Factual Questions
1
      • I find it maaaaajorly annoying when I accidentally end up going to a site that screws with the back buttons on the browser so that the only way to exit is to close the browser completely. If I disable Java, will this stop? Is Java the only way of doing this? - MC
2

Can you give the URL of a particular site?

Virtually yours,

DrMatrix

3

You have to disable all scripting; You can do it in VBScript as well. I’m not sure where the settings are in IE5.0; I’m still using 4.2. It’s probably in the Advanced tab.

4

If a site screws with your back button, you can still get back by right-clicking on the back button. This displays a menu of the places you’ve been, and you can just select the site you want.

5

The message board does this, hold on…

6

Okay, here’s the code that the sites use to manipulate the back button…

<meta http-equiv=“Refresh” content=“1 (or 0, so you’re get to the next page immediately); URL=web site you can’t get out of”>

That doesn’t look like Java, Javascript or VBScript to me.

Louie: young guy, possibly a bit green, but smart as paint. - Greg Charles

7

In Netscape, you can click on “Go” on the menu bar to see the list of recently viewed pages and jump back to any of them. In IE you can click on the little down arrow next to the “back” button and do the same.

8

if you disable all active x they cant throw you elsewhere. is that what you mean?

9

Redirection has nothing to do with javascript, vb, activex or anything else, although those can all be even more annoying at times.

Louie is right, it’s the refresh tag that messes with you. You go to a page and it says “You will be redirected to page 2 because of whatever…”, so your browser only shows that page for a moment and then goes on to page 2. Now, if you hit ‘Back’, your browser goes back to the “You will be redirected” page, and you get pushed back to page 2 again.

You either have to click back twice quickly, or use one of the menu options described above - it isn’t that tough to do. You get the list of all your previously viewed pages and just skip over the redirect page.

10

So, this practice is called “redirecting.” I say we start calling it Hijacking, because that’s what it feels like.

–It was recently discovered that research causes cancer in rats.

11

There are three ways to redirect:

  • in the zone file for the domain. Immediate and completely transparent to the user. The drawback is that you can only point a domain to another domain or IP address, and not to a directory.

  • with a meta refresh tag (like the one Louie posted). Not necessarily quick or transparent.

  • with some form of script - Java or VB.

12

It’s not usually done out of malice, although it can seem that way. It’s considered impolite (at least according to the HTML Writer’s Guild) to use a META refresh so brief that you can’t see it.

I lead a boring life of relative unimportance. Really.

13

I think what MC was asking about is not automatic redirection pages but those pages who completely remove the Back/Forward buttons from your browser (and usually the address window, the entire icon bar and occasionally the menu bar as well). Essentially, they trap you on their page.

Sometimes you can get away from these by holding down the Control key and hitting the left arrow key on your keyboard. It still doesn’t bring back the rest of your browser controls though; you do have to close your browser and re-open it to get them back.

Yes, they are doing it with Java or ActiveX. Turn off Java and ActiveX support in your browser.

“Sometimes I think the web is just a big plot to keep people like me away from normal society.” — Dilbert

14

That’s terrible. While using Navigator, the closest thing I’ve seen to that is when a site opens another browser window without controls. Never has a site removed the controls from my main browser window. Ick. It does sound like (as you said) an ActiveX function of IE to which Navigator is blissfully immune. whew

I’d love to see a URL guilty of this, for curiosity’s sake.

15

when i was still on AOL; someone familiar with porn site operations told me to disable active x. it worked . . after that . . when i closed a page . . another didnt pop up in its place. it also killed those damn geocities “a few words from our sponser” windows.

16

DOES IT REALLY?

That alone is reason enough to disable Active X. I hate pop-up windows of any kind :mad:

–It was recently discovered that research causes cancer in rats.

17
      • That, and the fact that there seems to be 3,000 security holes in it, if you’re using IE 4. I won’t download 5, I think I can smell it already.
      • Some pages (mostly porn sites, but there are others that do it too) don’t “list” in the address window of your browser. Every address doesn’t list individually. Some porn sites set it all up so that if you accidentally hit a link that sends you there, you have to shut off your browser to get out. - MC
18

What I hate more is those darn pages that automatically open a new window when you close it. Several times I’ve clicked on a link only to find out it’s nothing but porn (not when Im not searching for it :slight_smile: ) and I try to close it…only to find out another window pops up with a different porn page…close that one and another opens with more porn…

It can be really embarrassing at work :slight_smile: