Please, use a link!

This is a rant. It didn't start today, but I think I've reached the end of the line. The straw that broke the camel's back, so to say. I used an internal tool for the first time. I logged in and navigated through the web app, making some updates here and there. All was well. But then I made the mistake of wanting to go back to the initial dashboard. I clicked the back button, and instead of returning to the previous page, I saw Chrome's default tab page staring right back at me. How is it possible? I had navigated through at least a dozen pages, yet one back button click and the web app was completely gone. If you've ever experienced something similar, it's probably because you were using a single-page app. Nothing wrong with single-page apps, of course, but over the years I've concluded that people who only know how to build single-page apps don't know what a link is. So let's start with examples of what a link isn't. <div onclick="navigate('home')">Home</div> Not a link. It's a div…