[whatwg] modal and modeless windows

[Matthew Raymond]

Karl Pongratz wrote:
> Let's take the subscription page in case that we would have a modal 
> window. You would still browse to the subscription page, though it 
> wouldn't have any form field on it, instead there is a link "Click here 
> to subscribe", clicking on it opens a modal window (smaller than the 
> main window), which contains the form fields for the subscription. Fill 
> in the form, submit it, show some "Thank you for your subscription", 
> that's it, then close the window manually.
> 
> You may not want to do that for very simple forms like a subscription 
> page, but it becomes very handy for complex forms where you use a lot of 
> DHTML, AJAX, Xforms or whatsoever. As far as I know, AJAX applications 
> break your web browser history, though if you do the complex AJAX part, 
> let's say a complex Wizard, inside a modal window then it wont break you 
> web browser history, and you wont have pages in your web browser history 
> which shouldn't be there anyway.

    If you have AJAX, why not submit form data via XMLHttpRequest rather 
than changing the current URL? That way, there is no back button within 
the context of navigating the application.