Why "return false" doesn't work?
önem: 3
Why in the code below return false doesn’t work at all?
<script>
function handler() {
alert( "..." );
return false;
}
</script>
<a href="/?originalUrl=https%3A%2F%2Ftr.javascript.info%2F%26quot%3Bhttp%3A%2F%2Fw3.org%26quot%3B%2520onclick%3D%26quot%3Bhandler()%26quot%3B%26gt%3Bthe%2520browser%2520will%2520go%2520to%2520w3.org%26lt%3B%2Fa%26gt%3B%253C%2Fcode">
The browser follows the URL on click, but we don’t want it.
How to fix?
When the browser reads the on* attribute like onclick, it creates the handler from its content.
For onclick="handler()" the function will be:
function(event) {
handler() // the content of onclick
}
Now we can see that the value returned by handler() is not used and does not affect the result.
The fix is simple:
<script>
function handler() {
alert("...");
return false;
}
</script>
<a href="/?originalUrl=https%3A%2F%2Ftr.javascript.info%2F%26quot%3Bhttp%3A%2F%2Fw3.org%26quot%3B%2520onclick%3D%26quot%3Breturn%2520handler()%26quot%3B%26gt%3Bw3.org%26lt%3B%2Fa%26gt%3B%253C%2Fcode">
Also we can use event.preventDefault(), like this:
<script>
function handler(event) {
alert("...");
event.preventDefault();
}
</script>
<a href="/?originalUrl=https%3A%2F%2Ftr.javascript.info%2F%26quot%3Bhttp%3A%2F%2Fw3.org%26quot%3B%2520onclick%3D%26quot%3Bhandler(event)%26quot%3B%26gt%3Bw3.org%26lt%3B%2Fa%26gt%3B%253C%2Fcode">