Click a link and need to go back 10x to get back. Yes, I enjoy the footballs.

  • officermike@lemmy.world
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    10 days ago

    Yeah, I also hate back-button hijacking. I suspect some websites do it to artificially force more page views for ad revenue. Try a long-press on the back button to view the history for that browser tab and click on the most recent page you think won’t redirect.

    • yeehaw@lemmy.ca
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      10 days ago

      I usually right click the back button and go 2 entries back. Done.

      Microsoft also does this a lot on some of their sites.

      • WalrusDragonOnABike [they/them]@lemmy.today
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        10 days ago

        Usually with this, it’s like 20 entries, so pushes everything else off.

        The ones where it’s only a couple entries mostly seem to be the ones where there’s multiple articles on a single page and it’s at least might be attempting to be helpful?

    • Valmond@lemmy.world
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      10 days ago

      Youtube does it, and it just continues to blast the wrong video you accidentally just auto-started because instead if fucking off, it shows other videos with the bad video getting just reduced.

      Aaargh for the state of todays internet

    • where_am_i@sh.itjust.works
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      9 days ago

      I hate that this is even a feature in the web standard. A result of some massive corporate corruption for sure.

  • The Pantser@lemmy.world
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    10 days ago

    This could easily be fixed by the browsers but they don’t. Sure wish these back button tricks would stop. Especially news sites try to keep you from getting back to your search and makes your page refresh over and over. I wonder if that behavior counts as hits to their advertisers.

    • ilinamorato@lemmy.world
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      10 days ago

      I don’t know about “easily.” replaceState() is actually intended to make single-page apps easier to use, by allowing you to use your back button as expected even when you’re staying on the same URL the entire time.

      Likewise, single-page apps are intended to be faster and more efficient than downloading a new static page that’s 99.9% identical to the old one every time you change something.

      Fixing this bad experience would eliminate the legitimate uses of replaceState().

      Now, what they could do is track your browser history “canonically” and fork it off whenever Javascript alters its state, and then allow you to use a keyboard shortcut (Alt + Back, perhaps?) to go to the “canonical” previous item in history instead of to the “forked” previous item.

      • SplashJackson@lemmy.ca
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        10 days ago

        I can handle life without the legitimate use case if it means no more clickjacking bs from companies that should know better

        • ilinamorato@lemmy.world
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          10 days ago

          I’d prefer not to let the bad actors dictate browser design.

          “Let’s get rid of images since companies can use images to spoof browserchrome elements.”

          “Let’s get rid of text since scammers can pretend to be sending messages from the computer’s operating system.”

          “Let’s get rid of email since phishing exists.”

          Nah. We can do some stuff (like the aforementioned forked history) to ameliorate the problem, and if it’s well-known enough, companies won’t find it necessary anymore. Heck, browsers like Firefox would probably even let you select Canonical Back as the default Back Button behavior, and then you can have the web the way you want it (like people who disable Javascript).

          • gwen@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            10 days ago

            like people who disable Javascript).

            i do that, and i found that a TON of microsoft & bank/work websites just refuse to do anything without it. i love the modern internet /s

          • ggppjj@lemmy.world
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            10 days ago

            I’m frustrated that removing bad functionality is being treated as a slippery slope with obviously bad and impossible jokes as the examples chosen.

            I see a bad feature being abused, and I don’t see the removal of that bad feature as a dangerous path to getting rid of email. I don’t ascribe the same weight that you seem to towards precedent in this matter.

            • ilinamorato@lemmy.world
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              9 days ago

              I’ve been working in full stack for long enough to know that history manipulation is as much a part of the modern web as images and email. I’m not trying to be flippant, that’s just the state of the modern web. Single-page apps are here, and that’s a good thing. They’re being used badly, and that’s endemic to all features. So no, history manipulation is not “bad functionality,” though I admit it’s not fully baked in its current implementation.

      • deejay4am@lemmy.world
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        10 days ago

        Pop a window open with a your app in it (with the user’s permission) without a back button if you want that.

        A web page should be a document, not an experience.

        • ilinamorato@lemmy.world
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          10 days ago

          That would absolutely make everything worse, no question; the web should be more integrated, not less. We shouldn’t incentivize even more companies to silo off their content into apps.

  • randon31415@lemmy.world
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    10 days ago

    Also: Algorithmic generated feeds where you try to click on one thing, but you click on the next thing in the list and when you click back, the feed looks completely different because it has new information on you. That thing you wanted to click on is gone and will never return.

    • IndiBrony@lemmy.world
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      10 days ago

      That’s actually how I do my Lemmy feed. I have one chance to comment on a thread and if I back out, the page refreshes and I lose it forever.

      I’ve learned to accept that there are just some things the universe never wanted me to comment on.

      • Angry_Autist (he/him)@lemmy.world
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        10 days ago

        I’d love that, my entire frontpage is the same 30 things over and over unless I deliberately sort for something then it’s a DIFFERENT 30 things over and over

        • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          9 days ago

          Try some different sorting options. I’ve found “Active” and “Hot” to be kind of shitty (though to be fair, I haven’t really used them in like 6 months so maybe they’re better).

          I usually go for “Top 6 Hours” or “Top 12 Hours” for stuff that’s not too old and relatively active.

      • ...m...@ttrpg.network
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        9 days ago

        …and now you’ve hit upon my other peeve: (mostly shopping) sites coded to disable browsing links in a new tab…

        • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          Perhaps it’s because I never raw dog the web, and using uBlock Origins on “medium mode” somehow fixes it, but I don’t think I have ever experienced that.

          I have experienced sites that block right clicking, and that has always infuriated me. But I was able to get a little FF extension that disables right click blocking on websites. Which is pretty useful for downloading videos on sites that try to stop you from downloading their videos (though some have wisened up and can completely disable the ability to save a video through that method. The “save video as” option is completely greyed out). yt-dlp usually works in those cases, or one of the countless web-based video downloaders… but still annoying.

      • Skyhighatrist@lemmy.ca
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        10 days ago

        What’s worse is that YouTube sometimes doesn’t do that, i.e. when you hit back it shows the same list from the cache or something. It gives you hope and makes it worse on those occasions when it does fully refresh on back.

    • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
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      9 days ago

      Youtube recommended videos does this. Not a huge issue because I can always search for the video myself but it’s annoying.

      • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        9 days ago

        Ugh yes.

        Though on desktop I’ve completely switched over to using FreeTube, and I’ve been loving it. The order of the videos in the feed does not change. It’s great.

    • Scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech
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      10 days ago

      It’s not for this, of course. It’s because in the world of single page applications built in react and angular where there is no physical back, like no actual server page to go back to just JavaScript, you have to code in what the back button means. Even though there’s no server calls to ask for a new page. New page. Most people still expect that forward and back will still go forward and back in standard navigation.

      Sites like this it’s pretty clear that they just overwrite that with the last 20 calls to their own page, but the alternative is that single page applications would not be able to have forward or back functionality

        • Scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech
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          10 days ago

          Great I’ll just add a unique guid to each path that is ignored and returns to the same place. You show me a 10 foot fence I’ll show you an 11 foot ladder.

          • hddsx@lemmy.ca
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            9 days ago

            I mean, I get that. I was making a joke. But 12 ft fence? Load in sandbox and compare html. Your move.

              • hddsx@lemmy.ca
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                9 days ago

                14 ft fence: Diff in html. If less than 10 lines different, ban.

                • PoolloverNathan@programming.dev
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                  9 days ago

                  15 ft ladder:

                  <div hidden>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  <?= rand() ?>
                  </div>
                  
    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      10 days ago

      It’s a very “dumb” implementation of a generally useful feature. Browsers don’t keep track of how many times you’re redirected to the same site or try to consolidate the back-button list accordingly, but they certainly could. Wouldn’t be surprised if there was a plugin to this effect.

      • groet@feddit.org
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        10 days ago

        They actually do. To avoid infinite loops. If a URL redirects to the identical URL for more than ~5 times most browsers will refuse to load and show an error instead.

        That’s why sites like this will generate new URLs with the same content.

  • ‮redirtSdeR@lemmy.world
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    10 days ago

    I was just thinking about this.

    Super annoying because it can actually be fixed by using History.replaceState() over History.pushState().

    I guess the reason they do it is either to keep you stuck on their sucky site, or just incompetence.

    • Blackmist@feddit.uk
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      9 days ago

      Only the first time you visit in a while though.

      I think it’s taking you away to a login page, logging you in, then bringing you back.

      I can see the point if you were going to ask or answer a question, but 99% of the time you just want to see how somebody else didn’t get their problem solved by some random Indian guy who people assume works for Microsoft, who think the solution to everything is running “sfc /scannow” which has replaced chkdsk as the command most likely to take a long time, do nothing, and make the question asker go away without a solution to their problem.

    • Akasazh@feddit.nl
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      9 days ago

      What helps with this is clicking links with mousewheeldown, I automatically opens in a new tab. Also MWD on the tab label will close it, so you don’t have to aim for the ‘x’.

      A mouse with thumb buttons is really handy as they do foreward and back, double clicking that gets you out of the issue caused in op

  • foggy@lemmy.world
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    10 days ago

    Three things.

    1. Yes. Sometimes this is malice. Sometimes this is an attempt to drive impressions and page views.

    2. This can also be caused by poorly configured web applications that update in real time. If, say, some sports website is giving you real-time data about the game as it progresses, a poorly configured web application might be creating a dynamic URL for every change. When you access the older page, it will be instructed to take you to the most recent data, so pressing back is taking you to old data on that page, and then immediately realizing that data is old so refreshing it with the most relevant data.

    3. This is a super common misconfiguration in single page web applications. Domain.com will take you to an application that renders at domain.com/en-us/home. Pressing back takes you to domain.com, and guess what happens next?

    This is basically 99.99% of these cases. I would say if its on some shitty news site with 1000 ads that somehow sneak by AdBlock and UBlok Origin, it’s case 1. Otherwise, it’s case 2 or 3.

    The picture instance is either case 1 or 2.

    • ajikeshi@lemmy.world
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      10 days ago

      and neither case provides a service in a state that should be exposed to the outside. Either due to malice or incompetence.

      • mrvictory1@lemmy.world
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        9 days ago

        MS makes a redirect to log you in, you can hit back button twice to escape. Bad design but not malice.

    • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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      10 days ago

      Any website managed/developed by someone certified in the last decade or more knows not to do that.

      It’s absolutely malicious, both to drive SRO and to keep “accidental” clicks from backing out so quickly

  • Dizzy Devil Ducky@lemm.ee
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    10 days ago

    This is one of the absolute greatest reasons to support opening most everything in a new tab (as long as you don’t end up like my mom who at one point had over 100 tabs on her phone). Doesn’t matter if it’s a link from the same website, from a search engine, or whatever else there is. New tab.

    • ✺roguetrick✺@lemmy.world
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      10 days ago

      Then on android Firefox you accidentally hit the back button and it closes the tab and you can’t go forward and you already navigatedc away from the originating page on the other tab forcing you to open your history and try to figure out where the hell it is.

      • ChanchoManco@lemm.ee
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        9 days ago

        Ctrl Shift T doesn’t work on that case?

        Edit: I skipped the Android bit, sorry.

        Edit 2: From the 3 dots menu INSIDE the tabs view you can access a list of recently closed tabs, not nearly as fast as a 3 key combo, but maybe better than looking for the tab in the history. Also apparently there’s an extension that may help.

  • Eiri@lemmy.ca
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    10 days ago

    I’ve always wondered. Is there really a benefit to a ton of redirects like that? Like, do they gain anything by making it harder to back out?

    Or is it just extremely incompetent website programming?

    • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      9 days ago

      I always just assumed it was a form of “dark pattern” meant to try to stop people from leaving their website once they’ve entered (e.g., coming from a different site, you can’t just hit backspace or click back to immediately exit their site. You’re stuck now).

      • Eiri@lemmy.ca
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        9 days ago

        I think that’s right for a website where you accidentally clicked an ad and now it’s trying to convince you you have a virus and you need to download their virus to remove it. Or maybe for an ad pop-up where annoying you might increase the chances that the content makes it into your brain.

        But for a news website i have trouble seeing the logic.

          • Eiri@lemmy.ca
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            9 days ago

            I’d have expected ad providers to catch on pretty quickly that there’s cheating involved, no?

            • Krauerking@lemy.lol
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              9 days ago

              Nope. They just hear back about number of views and how it influences the shoppers and brags about how it works.

              I honestly think it’s mostly the idea of advertising that keeps it running as an industry.

              Like Facebook juicing their video viewership and recent news about Google using off screen ads in their views and impressions numbers.

            • ℍ𝕂-𝟞𝟝@sopuli.xyz
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              9 days ago

              They also get paid off of this, the advertiser pays for those impressions.

              Advertisers can’t switch because they can’t not be present on big platforms. The whole ad industry is just companies scamming each other and the consumer.

  • TedZanzibar@feddit.uk
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    10 days ago

    You’ve reminded me of a similar frustration that I’ve never found the answer to - though it may be adblock related - in that whenever I open a link to eBay it completely wipes the history for that tab. Or possibly it opens a new tab and kills the parent. Either way I always forget about it until the next time and then it drives me mad all over again.

    • deejay4am@lemmy.world
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      10 days ago

      Reddit has been doing this when I click a result from a Google search (yeah, sometimes you have to)

      It’s fucking annoying and I hope whatever JavaScript trick lets them do this gets blocked

      • gh0stcassette@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        10 days ago

        I use a Firefox based browser and this hasn’t happened to me, are you using Chromium or Safari? Could be a browser specific issue

        • TedZanzibar@feddit.uk
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          10 days ago

          Firefox. I’m fairly convinced it’s something to do with UBO or one of the blocklists but I’ve never taken the time to dig into it properly.

  • katy ✨@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    9 days ago

    microsoft does this with their community support/forums/whatever and it’s annoying when you’re trying to look up a problem in google. :///