Javascript: Check if the user is navigating away with a form submit or a simple link click.

Question

I need to do remind the users something when they are leaving the page, and that can be handled with the window.onUnload event. But I also need to check if the user is navigating away by submitting the form on the page, or by clicking the navigation links. I could use the form's onSubmit event to set a flag, and then check against that flag in the window.onUnload event, but I am not sure which one fires first.

any ideas ?

Answer 1

You actually want window.onbeforeunload

window.onbeforeunload = function (e) {
  var e = e || window.event;

  // For IE and Firefox
  if (e) {
    e.returnValue = 'Are You Sure?';
  }

  // For Safari
  return 'Are You Sure?';
};

Answer 2

It turns out that the form.onSubmit event fires first so i can use a flag. I have checked this in Firefox and Safari only.