Is there a way to track from which window.name a new window was opened (open in a new tab) with Javascript?

Question

I need to track all users browser activity from a starting point. All starting points have unique window.name assigned to them.

If a user clicks open in a new tab, I will lose this unique identifier to actually track each starting point. I need to find a somewhere an association between these two windows (the child and the parent window from which the child was triggered).

Can the "open in a new tab" be handled as an event so I can attach an event listener? Or what other solutions are there?

Answer 1

You've clarified your question in the comments below. You're asking specifically about the user right-clicking a link and choosing "Open in new tab." (As opposed to the user clicking links that you've set up to open in new tabs, which is how I read it originally.)

The simplest and most reliable way to do that is to modify the links on the page to pass the window name as a query string parameter:

var i, list, href;
list = document.getElementsByTagName("a");
for (i = 0; i < list.length; ++i) {
    href = list[i].href;
    if (href.indexOf("?") === -1) {
        href += "?wnd=" + encodeURIComponent(window.name);
    }
    else {
        href += "&wnd=" + encodeURIComponent(window.name);
    }
}

Then the target page just checks for the query string parameter in location.search .

Alternately, you can set some information in web session storage when the user clicks the link, and then check for it on the target page:

On the first page:

var i, list;
list = document.getElementsByTagName("a");
for (i = 0; i < list.length; ++i) {
    list[i].addEventListener("click", setWindowName, false);
    // If you need to handle IE8, you'll need to do the addEventListener / attachEvent dance
}
function setWindowName() {
    sessionStorage.wndname = window.name;
}

Then on the target page:

var sourceWindow = sessionStorage.wndname;

Other than that, you can give them a link that will open the window in a new tab for them (see below), but if they right-click the link and say "open in new tab," I don't think there's any connection between the two windows. On the server side you could check the REFERER [sic] HTTP header, but I don't think there's anything purely client-side.

Can i handle "open in a new tab" as an event...

I don't believe any event is raised when the user opens a link in a new window or tab.

---

If the window is opened via window.open or a link with target="..." , the new window will have an opener global, which is a reference to the window that opened it. So, opener.name .

Parent window example: Live Copy | Live Source

window.name = "parentwin";
document.querySelector('p').onclick = function() {
    window.open("/uTEzowOQ/1");
};

Or alternately via a link: Live Copy | Live Source

<p><a href="/uTEzowOQ/1" target="_blank">Click me</a></p>
<script>
window.name = "parentwin";
</script>

Child window: Source

if (!opener) {
    display("My <code>opener</code> isn't set.");
}
else if (!opener.name) {
    display("<code>opener.name</code> is blank");
}
else {
    display("My opener's name is " + opener.name);
}

Note that if you just go directly to the child page , it says "My opener isn't set". But if you go there via either of the parent pages above, you see "My opener's name is parentwin".