problem (IE8) inserting 'alternate rss link ' in "head" section fails. (Succeeds in Firefox 3.5)

Question

We wish to use jquery/javascript to add 'alternate link rss' elements in the section of a resulting html document, i.e. so the orange 'rss' icon shows up on the right side of the browser's url-bar (aka "awesome bar" in FF)

Such an approach simplifies adding the 'subscribe' links in the section. Each chunk of the page could add rss link(s) as needed in a single pass, rather than requiring two passes, one to gather the 'rss links', and another to render the page

Here's what I found:

I added this code to a test page (in a script block)

$( 
function() 
{
("<link rel='alternate' type='application/rss+xml' href='/path/to/another/rss'>").insertAfter("meta")
}

)

• It works in Firefox (version 3.5)

• It fails in IE8

• When it fails in IE8, it actually breaks any existing rss links. For example if the page's head section already had these links:

• After the javascript executes, IE8 grays out the 'orange' RSS button. (FF3.5, in contrast displays all three links correctly)

• I've tried a few other variants but with no success in IE8

Is this approach kosher? Do well-behaved browsers adjust their 'head' section on the fly as part of DOM manipulation? Any comments or insights?

thanks,

bill

Answer 1

Try:

$("head").append("<link rel='alternate' type='application/rss+xml' href='/path/to/another/rss'>");

Should work as expected.