Why doesn't beforeunload fire?

Question

I have read lots of other related posts, but cannot understand what's wrong with the following code:

$(window).on("beforeunload", function () {
    debugger
    handleBeforeUnload();
    return false;
});
function handleBeforeUnload() {
    if (location.pathname != "/") {
        location.assign(location.hostname + "/#" + location.pathname);
    }
}

I have also tried a pure JavaScript approach without success. The underlying problem I am trying to solve is with angular "pretty" URLs. Although clicking links work fine, when reloading a page (ex. mydomain.com/about) I get a 404 Not Found error. I found that manually inserting a hashbang (mydomain/#/about) works correctly.

What am I missing here?

Although it is a similar question, it did not give a specific answer for my platform (Apache) — ron tornambe, Jun 18 '16 at 15:56
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/22739455/htaccess-redirect-for-angular-routes, http://stackoverflow.com/questions/14168836/refreshing-page-gives-page-not-found, http://stackoverflow.com/questions/14319967/angularjs-routing-without-the-hash, http://stackoverflow.com/questions/34411206/multiple-htaccess-rewrite-conditions-angular-routes-html5-mode — Alexander O'Mara, Jun 18 '16 at 16:02

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered Jun 18 '16 at 15:52

1

What am I missing here

Your whole higher level problem stems from not configuring server to always serve the app entry point when you are using html5Mode pretty URL's

Server has no knowledge of the virtual directories that the client side app uses unless you configure it

answered Jun 18 '16 at 15:52

charlietfl

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How would you configure it using .htaccess (Apache)? – ron tornambe Jun 18 '16 at 15:54
Yes that is one way without accessing config files directly – charlietfl Jun 18 '16 at 15:57
Unfortunately, the beforeunload doesn't fire reliably. I wold prefer a server-side solution. – ron tornambe Jun 18 '16 at 16:02
you can't force user to go to unexpected places using `beforeunload`. Browser won't let you – charlietfl Jun 18 '16 at 16:05

Why doesn't beforeunload fire?

1 Answers1