RE: No current option to keep page from history.

> Would it be possible for the designers (programmers or 
> whatever) of HTML tags to add an extra tag? One that 
> prevents a page being listed in the history of a browser. 
> <NOHISTORY> for example.

You can just add the tag yourself -- but it won't do anything
in most browsers.  Even if it became part of the standard,
it still wouldn't do anything until everyone upgraded their
browsers.

Things you can do:

(1)  Set the page to expire almost immediately, so that the
browser won't bother to cache it.

(2)  Use a secure page -- some browsers won't save those.

These won't hide the URL, but they will hide the specific
content.  Someone suspicious enough will still be able to
follow the URL and create a similar session.

(3)  Redirect to a more innocuous URL.  

(4)  Instead of normal navigation, use only a single URL,
which includes a form (with POST, not GET).  Most
browsers will not save the data that was posted, and most
will save only one copy (the last) of the "same" URL.  If
their last action is to reload the "same" URL with innocent
content, that is what will show in the history.

This may play badly with search engines, though.


Things you can encourage the user to do:

(1)  Set the history list to a smaller number (10 instead of
10000).  This will speed browsing up a bit and save some
space.  It will also make it easier to expire the URLs they
want to hide.

(2)  Browse to several other sites afterwards -- including
some with similar names.  If there are ten more recent
urls starting with www.domesticdecorations.com then
www.domesticproblems.com *may* not be visible in the 
completion box.

Received on Thursday, 29 January 2004 11:05:26 UTC