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[rivers9]

I want to put a link on Page A that will redirect people to Page C, but through Page B. Page B is just a tracking site that automatically redirects to another site, so I want Page C to be what is displayed when you mouse over the link. Is there a way to do this?

Link on Page A:
<a href="Page B" target="_blank">Link name</a>

How can I make Page C be seen on mouse over, or at least hide Page B from being displayed?

[sde]

question: what exactly do you mean by tracking? how are you tracking it? does your server have php?

[teknomage1]

You'll need to use either server extensions for your web server or a server side scripting language. If you wanted it to be purely through html, you could put a "<meta refresh" directive but it would make your pages seem very sluggish and would display the url of page B.

[redhead]

My guess of what he is saying is something like this:

<a href="page_b?refresh_url=www.my_url.com" onMouseOver="window.status='www.my_url.com';" onMouseOut=window.status='';" target="_blank">Link name</a>

In order to have a tracking page, you will need some form of active server pages, that beeing ASP/PHP/CGI whatever..
I think he wan'ts to fool people visiting his site, so they won't see that he is actualy routing their request through a third party, where he recieves $$ for click-throughs.

[sde]

it could be a number of things which is why i ask what 'tracking' means. he could be just trying to track click throughs so he can know for himself if he's getting click throughs and not just rely on the companies that are supposed to be paying him.

or, if he had his own banner ad system where he wants to charge advertisers based on click throughs ..

or what red says ..

even with a meta refresh with a value of zero, you will see a quick flash of the page. if there is 'tracking' involved though, there must be some server-side technology happening.

and if there is server-side technology happening, then the best way is probably to do a header re-direct so the user does not see that they are being sent through a middle page.

i.e.

<a href="redirect.php?adid=2">text or image here</a>

and if it were php on the receiving end:

PHP Code:

<?
// logic to 'track' adid 2 goes here
header("location: http://final_address.com/");
?>

then again, he posted in the html forum so who knows. there are too many questions to give a good answer.

if there is no server-side stuff and if it was me, i would use a javascript re-direct rather than a meta refresh since it is quicker. something like

<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript">
window.location = "http://somesite.com";
</script>

[rivers9]

It's not a pay thing...Page B is just a site that tracks what AIM screen names click on the link. Page A therefore is your AIM profile - the site documents what screen name clicked on the link then redirects you to whatever page you want it to.

I tried doing something like this but it didn't work, it still shows Page B on mouse over...

<a href="Page B" target="_blank" onmouseover="window.status='page C';">Link name</a>

I'm not that familiar with PHP or javascript or really even HTML for that matter...but something simple like that would be best if it could be accomplished.

SDE the header redirect thing might work too...can you write it out using my "Page B" and "Page C" links? Please explain to me like I'm an idiot

[sde]

first, now i have a better idea, .. php header redirect is not the answer.

now, a couple things wrong here. first, are you using Firefox?

Firefox has a 'safety' feature on by default which prevents the status parameter from being changed. To verify this, you can to go [b]tools->options->web features->advanced->(check the change status bar text field)

Now, if your code works, then it will.

second, for me, i need to add a 'return true;' after setting windows.status for firefox.

<a href="Page B" onMouseOver="window.status='Page C';return true;" onMouseOut=window.status='';return true;" target="_blank">Link name</a>

[rivers9]

I don't use Firefox, just basic IE.

It's still not working...

[sde]

i would bet that it is prevented for security reasons in the latest patches of IE as well. i think you're out of luck.

try to google: IE windows.status doesn't work

or something like that.