I like that it doesn't automatically open in a new tab. That means I have control over whether I want it to open in a new tab. It puts users in control, and that's good.
Ask HN: Why doesn't Hacker News open links in a new tab?
11–20 of 38 posts
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't Hacker News open links in a new tab?
#12We had a spirited debate about this in our application at work recently. Some devs feel (strongly) that having no option to open links on the same page is a user-hostile choice. Other devs feels (also strongly) that users most likely want to open a link in a new tab so that’s what should happen.
We never reached an agreement but someone did make a claim, that I was unable to verify, that modern users don’t use the back button and therefore relying on it to allow users to find their way back is unacceptable. I wonder if anyone else has heard that (I suspect the HN crowd knows about the back button though ;))
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't Hacker News open links in a new tab?
#13But it does open links in a new tab, most of the time - because I choose to use my browser's "open in new tab" feature when I click on its links. I appreciate the fact that Hacker News lets me do what I want, instead of trying to override my preferences with some excessively clever bit of scripting.
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't Hacker News open links in a new tab?
#14Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't Hacker News open links in a new tab?
#15Middle-Click...Middle-Click...Middle-Click...Middle-Click...Middle-Click
That's the wheel, for you guys coming from a two-button-mouse Operating System.
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't Hacker News open links in a new tab?
#16target="_blank" is an anti-user design choice. If a link does not set target="_blank", you can always choose how it will be opened: in this tab, or in a new one, with a left or middle click. If it has target="_blank", it'll always open in a new tab, even if you don't want it to, and there's no visual indicator that this parameter has been set. I never set target="_blank" as a general rule for this reason.
If your page takes time to load and is not cached, opening in new tab makes it tolerable. Making virtue of of necessity and all that. Irritating example of slow page and regular links, scroll down, open a product link in same page, go back and wait for the spinner and see you lost scroll position. https://www.amazon.in/stores/page/7ACF7524-1CDD-45DE-A4F5-12...
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't Hacker News open links in a new tab?
#17target="_blank" is an anti-user design choice. If a link does not set target="_blank", you can always choose how it will be opened: in this tab, or in a new one, with a left or middle click. If it has target="_blank", it'll always open in a new tab, even if you don't want it to, and there's no visual indicator that this parameter has been set. I never set target="_blank" as a general rule for this reason.
If your page takes time to load and is not cached, opening in new tab makes it tolerable. Making virtue of of necessity and all that. Irritating example of slow page and regular links, scroll down, open a product link in same page, go back and wait for the spinner and see you lost scroll position. https://www.amazon.in/stores/page/7ACF7524-1CDD-45DE-A4F5-12...
The solution to this is not to use target="_blank" - it's not making the origin page non-cachable, take a long time to load, or require client-side state.
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't Hacker News open links in a new tab?
#18Middle-Click...Middle-Click...Middle-Click...Middle-Click...Middle-Click That's the wheel, for you guys coming from a two-button-mouse Operating System.
Which OS doesn't support multi-button mice?
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't Hacker News open links in a new tab?
#19We had a spirited debate about this in our application at work recently. Some devs feel (strongly) that having no option to open links on the same page is a user-hostile choice. Other devs feels (also strongly) that users most likely want to open a link in a new tab so that’s what should happen. We never reached an agreement but someone did make a claim, that I was unable to verify, that modern users don’t use the ba…
I typically use `⌘ [` and `⌘ ]` for back and forward navigation. It's rarely in conflict with other hotkey combos, unlike `⌘ →` and `⌘ ←`.
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't Hacker News open links in a new tab?
#20We had a spirited debate about this in our application at work recently. Some devs feel (strongly) that having no option to open links on the same page is a user-hostile choice. Other devs feels (also strongly) that users most likely want to open a link in a new tab so that’s what should happen. We never reached an agreement but someone did make a claim, that I was unable to verify, that modern users don’t use the ba…
Yeah I definitely sit strongly in the former camp (that is, navigation should be in the same tab for anything that is your content).
When linking externally or to something that isn't yours, I feel it makes sense to go to a new tab then.
> someone did make a claim, that I was unable to verify, that modern users don’t use the back button and therefore relying on it to allow users to find their way back is unacceptable
I think this person is projecting their own experiences. Would be interesting to see the impact that mobile browser experiences have brought to these interactions, but for instance Android has a literal OS wide back button. I think that claim is a pretty far stretch.