Is there a better way to manage windows?

[Steven T. Hatton]

This is one of the most problematic issues I have encountered in working 
with JavaScript.  The following code demonstrates the kind of difficulty 
I am having:

/* code */
var newSrc = "<H1>hello</H1>";

var w = window.open("javascript:opener.newSrc","w",
                 "height=300,width=400,scrollbars=yes");

var myDoc = w.document;

myDoc.writeln("<H1>world</H1>");
/* end code */

When I load the page the first time I get 'world'.  The first reload 
displays 'hello'.  Thereafter they toggle.  Such behavior makes it very 
difficult to work with windows and window.documents in a deterministic way.

The next piece of code shows another inelegant approach to this 
situation.  If you try this you will notice that, by commenting out the 
setTimeout(), and uncommenting the w.document.writeln(...) a different 
result is obtained.  In the shown case the text is displayed upon load 
and every subsequent reload. In the modified case the text is not 
displayed on odd numbered reloads.


/* code */
w = window.open("about:blank", "w","height=300, width=400, scrollbars=yes");

GOTO = "w.document.writeln('<H1>With setTimeout</H1>')";

setTimeout(GOTO, 0);

// w.document.writeln('<H1>No setTimeout</H1>')

/* end code */

As my choice of variable names indicates the setTimeout is a 
non-returning branch statement.  Am I the only person who sees a problem 
with this situation?  To me this is a major issue.  I'd like to be able 
to do something similar to:

myDoc = null;

var str = "<H1>Hello World</H1>";
if (myDoc) {
   myDoc.writeln(str);
} else {
   w = window.open("about:blank"                                                       
         ,"mainWin","height=300, width=400, scrollbars=yes");
   myDoc = w.document;
   myDoc.writeln(str);
}

Unfortunately this does not produce the desired/expected result.

Opinions?

Steven