How to open links externally

[Robin]

Using Kendo UI Mobile v2013.1.319 and PhoneGap 2.6.0 (iOs), I'm no longer able to open links in the Safari browser.

This worked well on previous versions:

<a href="http://apache.org" data-rel="external" target="_blank">

But now it still opens in the same webview as the app itself. 

Any tips how to force the links to open externally? Preferably without using javascript.  

[Petyo]

Hi Robin,

I think that the problem might be related to a specific phonegap behavior. Can you please check this article and see if the suggestions listed in it work for you? 

Kind regards,
Petyo
the Telerik team

[Robin]

It seems the only way to do it is to use javascript and window.open - to either launch the browser or the InAppBrowser (simply adding "target=_blank" doesn't work).

Perhaps for future releases of Kendo UI Mobile you could make this happen automatically depending on the target attribute of the anchor element. For example if the target is "_blank" or "_iab" it calls the window.open and makes the page load in the InAppBrowser.

We tried different solutions for overriding the a click event, but found none that worked 100%. 

[Petyo]

Hello Robin,

Thank you for your suggestion. I am not sure if we should assume and hard-code the external links behavior on behalf of the application developer, though. From what I see, PhoneGap is also not sure what people expect to happen when a link with target="_blank" is clicked, hence the abundance of discussions (and solutions) available as google results.

If you discover that Kendo UI Mobile is somehow interfering with the suggested solutions (e.g. a solution works in a regular web page with links in it, but does not work with data-rel="external" links when a Kendo UI Mobile app is instantiated), please let us know. We will do our best to help. 

All the best,
Petyo
the Telerik team

[Brian]

I'm experiencing this issue as well.  The link that you said to look at no longer exists.  Has any concrete solution for this been determined?  

[Petyo]

Hello Brian,

This is the article which I linked to originally. 

Regards,
Petyo
Telerik