This is almost invisible yet extremely helpful feature of FireFox web browser.

The two great inventions – middle button in mice and the Web – emerged virtually simultaneously (though independently). And they made a really great tandem: when you click links you control at ease whether they open in a new window by simply choosing a mouse button – left or middle. That simple.

Yet, internet tricksters turn up here and there (surprisingly or not – much more notably so in former USSR (CIS) web space) who abuse the early-internet oversighted adoption of the target attribute for the <a> anchor tag. As you know, when this attribute is set to “_blank” the linked page opens in a new window regardless of the site visitor’s choice.

That’s annoying. Just try to imagine Google SERP with ALL the links in the results page with such behavior. Unimaginable. Absolutely. Nevertheless, major search engines in Russia & Ukraine feature this. Some sites in the “developed” world unfortunately still do so too.

Now FireFox has come to get back the web. This “_blank” weirdness is easily cured in standard UI.

But what about Opera? It’s a nice browser having great deal of appeals compared even to wildly growing in popularity FireFox, and it lacks this much needed control.

There’s a solution for Opera as well. It’s through User JavaScript. Very cool.