在<a>鼠标按下而不是鼠标点击时</a>跟随<a>链接</a>

Question

I am using the following code to make the browser follow a link on mouse down instead of on mouse up (like a normal click).

$('#links a').each(function(){
  $(this).mousedown(function(){
    window.location.href=$(this).attr('href');
  });
});

First of all, is this good practice? GMail does this and it gives the effect that the page is loading faster than it actually is.

Also, is there a better way of doing this? I haven't tested this in all browsers yet, so I'm not sure if it works in older browsers.

Answer 1

The mousedown function is not supported by Internet Explorer version 5.5 or earlier. jQuery normalizes the browser-specific behavior of the event capture into the mousedown function.

As to good practice or not, I don't see a tangible performance benefit from handling mouse click events in this way. So, unless you have a specific reason for doing so, I would stay with standard conventions.

Answer 2

The only thing that should happen on mouse down is any necessary effects to show the user the mouse button is indeed down.

The reason you don't execute anything until mouse up goes back to at least the Apple Human Interface Guidelines for the original Macintosh: This gives the user the option of "canceling" their click by moving the mouse off the button before letting go.

Doing things on mouse down will give the user the sense that your program is pulling the rug, er, dialog box out from under them.