I know this is a done and sorted out deal, but here's what I'm using to solve the problem in my app.
if (!e.target.hasAttribute("target")) {
e.preventDefault();
e.target.setAttribute("target", "_blank");
e.target.click();
return;
}
Basically what is going on here is I run a check for if the link has target=_blank
attribute. If it doesn't, it stops the link from triggering, sets it up to open in a new window then programmatically clicks on it.
You can go one step further and skip the stopping of the original click (and make your code a whole lot more compact) by trying this:
if (!e.target.hasAttribute("target")) {
e.target.setAttribute("target", "_blank");
}
If you were using jQuery to abstract away the implementation of adding an attribute cross-browser, you should use this instead of e.target.setAttribute("target", "_blank")
:
jQuery(event.target).attr("target", "_blank")
You may need to rework it to fit your exact use-case, but here's how I scratched my own itch.
Here's a demo of it in action for you to mess with.
(The link in jsfiddle comes back to this discussion .. no need a new tab :))