
Recently, I was bitten by a IE bug.

On one of the page I am working on, there are two radio buttons. The requirement is to auto-submit the page when the user clicks on one of the radio button. Apart from the radio buttons, there is an `<input type="submit" onclick="someJavaScript(param1, param2);" />` element too, but this is hidden as per the UI requirements.

So, in order to do auto-submit of the page on click of radio button, my first approach was to, bind an event handler to the radio button and programmatically click on the submit button. Below is the source code to do this:

```javascript
(function(){
  $('#radioBtnId').on('click', function(event){
    $('#submitBtnId').click();
  });
}());
```

Well, a simple & straight forward code, isn't it!? But, IE8 doesn't think so (surprise!).

While the above code works well in Chrome / Firefox / IE9, it is failing in IE8. On investigating, I came to know that IE8 does not trigger events for the hidden elements.

So, IE is just being an IE here and I had to look for other ways to implement the auto-submit.

Luckily, in my case, the submit button need not to be clicked. It is enough if I could just invoke the `onclick` event handler defined in the submit element (this is a framework generated code, so I don't have control over it).

In JavaScript, you can call a function in multiple ways.

1. You can simple use the name of the function to call it: `doSomething()`.
2. In case of anonymous function, you can directly invoke it: `(function(){}());` This is known as [IIFE] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immediately-invoked_function_expression "Immediately Invoked Function Expression").
3. You can either use `call` or `apply`. For example, `doSomething.apply(context, [])` / `doSomething.call(context, arg1, arg2)`.

So, I can use the third approach to invoke the `onclick` event handler here, as shown below.

```javascript
(function(){
  $('#radioBtnId').on('click', function(event){
    var submitBtn = document.getElementById('submitBtnId');
    submitBtn.onclick.apply(submitBtn);
  });
}());
```

That finally fixed it in IE8 and other browsers obliged too!
```


IE8 and Triggering event on hidden submit button


If you are using your Opera Mini mobile browser to access regional websites, you might have faced this issue. Instead of seeing the proper regional content (in my case, its Tamil), you might have seen boxes all over there in that tiny mobile screen. This is because, by default, Opera Mini browser couldn't be able to render the complex scripts, i.e. regional fonts.

So, to enable the regional (Tamil or Telugu or you name it!) language in Opera Mini browser,

1.  Open the address **about:config** in your opera mini browser. This will open the browser's option page.
2.  Scroll down until you see something like this: **Use bitmap fonts for complex scripts**.
3.  Set the above option value to **yes** and then click on **Save** button.

That's it. Now you'll be able to enjoy the local content from your Opera Mini browser.

## Technicalities:

All the web traffic from Opera Mini browser goes through Opera's proxy servers, which optimize the web content for mobile experience. As I said above, Opera Mini does not have the capability to render complex scripts in mobile. So, by setting the above option, we are letting the Opera's proxy servers to render the complex scripts as images and send those images to mobile browser. Thus you'll see the regional content as images, instead of fonts.

PS: came to know about this tip when I met the Tamil tweeters on last Sunday. Thanks to them for sharing this info.


Regional font support in Opera Mini


Initially there were no problems with Google Chrome browser. It just worked out of the box. But suddenly one fine day, it stopped loading web pages, showing 'Error 104 (net::ERR_CONNECTION_FAILED)' message. At first I thought it's a fresh bug coming out of chrome, Since Firefox and IE were just fine, I had to put the blame on Chrome.

But later, I found that **Zone Alarm firewall is blocking Chrome**. Somehow, the application settings for Chrome in Zone alarm are all set to 'Deny' and Chrome was failing to make a connection to internet. At first, I didn't have a clue why chrome was failing but when I googled for the error message '[`Error 104 (net::ERR_CONNECTION_FAILED)`][1]', it came to my mind that firewall might be the problem.

[1]: http://www.google.com/search?rlz=1C1GGLS_enIN291&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=Error 104 (net::ERR_CONNECTION_FAILED)

Now changed the setting and Chrome is back in action.


#browser (3)