Philadelphia Reflections

Open a new window with XHTML

Once upon a time you could say

<a href="link" target="_blank">Click to open a new window</a>

and a new window would open. Highly annoying if used very often, but sometimes it's the right thing to do.

And then XHTML comes along and this is not longer legal.

target="_blank" is "deprecated" without a single word as to what a poor developer is to substitute.

Here's what you do:

<a href="link" onclick="window.open(this.href); return false;">Click to open a new window</a>

Originally published: Monday, August 07, 2006; most-recently modified: Monday, June 04, 2012