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I'm making a web application, server need to track which browser tab/window the request was coming from.

My approach:

Pass the window/tab name (window.name) as a parameter with all requests from browser to server.

Questions:

1. Is there a generic way of doing this i.e append the parameter to url on the fly, instead of append the parameter to forms, anchors and ajax calls individually?

2. Is there a better approach?

DuoDuoJen
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  • Can u explain the purpose of tracking?? – Harish Ambady Jun 28 '13 at 10:20
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    @HarishAnchu this is someone else's answer to a similar question that explains my case as well. User opens initial session on browser tab 1 --> User adds item into cart on tab 1, initiating order --> User opens tab 2, which is in the same session, same order --> User does some things on tab 2, but eventually returns to tab 1 --> User completes order on tab 1, and returns to tab 2. --> User now expects tab 2 to work, even though the associated order has already been submitted. – DuoDuoJen Jun 28 '13 at 11:57

1 Answers1

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I think tracking tab as you said is not a good way. To track the changes associated with a user you can use the polling methods.

  1. Pull method - Client(browser tabs) query with server in a repeated interval of time to know the changes(For eg: Ajax request). If you use this method your server must be capable of handling large amount of requests.
  2. Push method - In this method server pushes messages to the clients whenever there is a new message. This method is advanced than pull method and this will be a live communication(ie, client gets live updates from server with no time. In pull method there is a time interval between each query).eg: Faye, pusher, socket.io

Hope this helps you.

Harish Ambady
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  • Not sure if that's what I need, I might be able to track changes a user made on the site with your methods, but I still don't know which is the one the user want to proceed with, in my case I don't want to make the assumption that the last change is the right one. Back to the order example, all changes made in both tabs are valid until user complete order in one tab, things associated with that tab will be erased, but user can still proceed with the other tab if they want without mixing the order items and anything else. Thanks for the effort anyway.. – DuoDuoJen Jun 28 '13 at 13:48
  • Did not address the question. – Anthony Palmer Jul 05 '13 at 10:56