Popup Windows: Targeting the Opener
Once a popup window has been created, linking from the popup back to the main window (i.e. the window which opened the popup) is a little trickier than might be expected. The problem is that the main window doesn't have a "name" the way the popup window does. Fortunately, JavaScript provides an answer in the form of
opener
.
To create links in the popup window that target back to the main window, first put this JavaScript in the <HEAD>
of the popup page:
<SCRIPT TYPE="text/javascript">
<!--
function targetopener(mylink, closeme, closeonly)
{
if (! (window.focus && window.opener))return true;
window.opener.focus();
if (! closeonly)window.opener.location.href=mylink.href;
if (closeme)window.close();
return false;
}
//-->
</SCRIPT>
A link that uses this script looks like this:
<A
HREF="rbex.html"
onClick="return targetopener(this)">my page</A>
which creates the link in
this popup window.