Window.Open Causes Browser Compatibilty Issues

One of the things that always annoys me as a web developer is when native browser functions that are accesible from JavaScript do not share the same function signature. One perfect example of this is the window.open function. When you are using non-Microsoft browsers such as Firefox and Chrome, you are able to make a call something like this window.open(url, 'window name', 'dimensions or other settings');. The window name parameter is important because it allows you to open multiple links in the same external window/tab. However, when using Internet Explorer, especially Internet Explorer 8 and older, you can only use window.open(url);. If you try to use the first type of function call, you get a very ambiguous error message in the browser that doesn’t tend to show exactly where the error occurred.

It is safe to say that I will remember that there is something to be wary of when using window.open when multiple browser support is required.