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Now the help link on the top bar leads to #, like this:

<a title="Help Center and other resources" class="icon-help js-help-button" href="#">
  help
  <span class="triangle"></span>
</a>

Please link it to help, like this:

<a title="Help Center and other resources" class="icon-help js-help-button" href="/help">
  help
  <span class="triangle"></span>
</a>

That way if I will need to open help center to provide some references, I will be able to just middle-click it and have help center in new tab. Now clicking help while writing custom close reason can close the dialog for me, destroying what I wrote, and that's not a good thing...

It will not interfere with current functionality, as far as I have tested it. It seems existing code already cancels default browser action anyway.

On normal click it does popup the box all right, even with href="/help". What I'm asking for does not interfere with current workflow. On the other hand, middle click now duplicates open page in another tab. That's counter-intuitive. Middle click on help should open the help, not the page I'm already on. If it will open the help menu box, so be it, not what I want but makes sense. The way it is now does not. And of course it would provide a bit of graceful degradation to a top bar, for the rare cases of JavaScript failure.

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  • 1
    on click it need to popup the box, I think no need for that, anyway it display that link inside the box. – Bala Dec 11 '13 at 10:49
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    @Bala on normal click it does popup the box all right, even with href="/help". What I'm asking for does not interfere with current workflow. On the other hand, middle click now duplicates open page in another tab. That's counter-intuitive. Middle click on help should open the help, not the page I'm already on. If it will open the help menu box, so be it, not what I want but makes sense. The way it is now does not make much sense. – Mołot Dec 11 '13 at 10:52
  • +1, I agree with this :) – Bala Dec 11 '13 at 10:56
  • You don't need href="..." for this. The existing code that open the menu can identify a middle click and redirect in such a case, while opening the menu in case of ordinary click. +1. – ShaWiz Dec 17 '13 at 8:16
  • @ShaWizDowArd href was simplest way I was able to think of, and provides a tiny bit of graceful degradation, but if existing code will take care, I don't mind. – Mołot Dec 17 '13 at 8:22
  • @Mołot not really (i.e. it's not that simple to do), code will still have to detect type of click and cancel the default browser action in case of a left click. Anyway such behavior doesn't exist anywhere on Stack Exchange, guess that's one reason they're not doing this. Consistency matters. :-) – ShaWiz Dec 17 '13 at 8:27
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    @ShaWizDowArd But when I added my own user scritp that just changes href, it works perfectly, without any problems. Tested on Chrome and FF. No changes to existing code, only href substitution on document ready. Code here already cancels default browser action. – Mołot Dec 17 '13 at 8:30
  • @Mołot can't repro what you did. changed the href="#" to href="/help" using Chrome dev tools and it just kept opening the menu. Anyway, we don't have to write the code, the dev team might end up with a different way anyway. :) – ShaWiz Dec 17 '13 at 8:33
  • @ShaWizDowArd well that's the point, it should keep opening the menu as it is now, unless middle clicked - then browse should have meaningful href to open in new tab (or wherever I tell it to). – Mołot Dec 17 '13 at 8:35
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    @ShaWizDowArd I opened Firebug, changed the href to "/help", middle-clicked, and it worked. – michaelb958 Dec 17 '13 at 8:35
  • @ShaWizDowArd For consistency, other links in top bar might use meaningful hrefs too. Or no href at all. href="#" is a bit of an overkill, as script already cancels any use of it. Do you think I should expand my request?.. – Mołot Dec 17 '13 at 8:40
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    @michaelb958'saSleigh weird, but like I said to the OP we're doing all of this for nothing. :) – ShaWiz Dec 17 '13 at 8:45
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    @ShaWizDowArd at least it will not get closed due to lack of minimal understanding or own research ;p – Mołot Dec 17 '13 at 8:48
1

I think the bigger issue is that that new the Help link in the top-bar dismisses other windows.

Help is important, and should not disrupt what you are doing. Also, the links in the dropdown links from can be useful when other windows are open, especially the close dialog.

I think a better solution would be to change the Help dropdown to not dismiss other windows, but be allowed to be open at the maximum z-index. You could potentially argue that all of the dropdowns in the top-bar should behave this way, too.

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  • To be honest I don't see why these solutions should be "better" or "worse" as they are pretty orthogonal and I'd like to see both implemented: non-disruptive open, and sane middle-click action. I may agree your point is more important, but both make sense. – Mołot Dec 28 '13 at 17:23

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