SharePoint Online - Errors and inconsistent experiences opening documents from Content Search results web part

Question

Some of the users in our environment experience a 'Something Went Wrong' error when they are looking at documents in a Content Search web part which is fed results from a Search Box web part. They click the name to open the document and sometimes it opens in a separate window, in the application best suited (e.g. MSG files open in Outlook), and sometimes it opens in a new tab or in the same tab. When this is the case, clicking the back button to return to the page with Search web parts throws an error in the CSWP, giving a correlation ID and noting that the server returned 403.

I have a suspicion that this is related to the back button behavior and there may not be a true fix other than altering user behavior, but some insight would be helpful on what this error means, as well as any advice on how to standardize the experience of how these documents open.

Answer 1

Hi Jonathan,

Thanks for sharing. We have received the private message and I am trying to build a similar one and test it.

About the Sorting issues you mentioned in the PM, did you configured it in the SORTING tab?

May I ask if this behavior happens to all the Content Search web part?

Regards,

Alex

Answer 2

Hi Jonathan,

Thanks for coming back. When I open a PDF file in a content search web part and it opens in the same tab, but I did not get the 403 error when I click the return button. It just goes back to the previous page.

To narrow down this issue, here are some questions we want to confirm with you first. Some of them are confidential, please share them via PM: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/privatemessage/inbox.

1. Does this behavior relate to the browser you are using? Have you tried different browsers?
2. Could you share a  correlation ID with us?
3. What is the query you set? You could get the query text in the Advanced mode:

Regards,

Alex

Answer 3

We are seeing this error when opening PDF files because the file opens in-browser in the same tab. So I believe this has something to do with the click of the back button, because that is when we see these 403 errors.

Answer 4

Hi Jonathan

Haven't heard form you for a while. Welcome to reply at your convenience and share more with us.

Regards,

Alex

Answer 5

Hi Jonathan,

About how to open the document(most Office documents like docx, xlsx, or pptx) in SharePoint Online, there is a related setting to control open within the browser or open in client applications. The setting is available in the libraries and sites. library setting can inherit from the site or don't. When opening the documents in the search results, the opening method should follow the library setting where the files are.

About the behavior that open items in a new tab or new window, there should be a setting in the browser. Sometimes Outlook online will open emails in new windows, such as when you double-click the email.

About open in a new tab or in the same tab, that should depend on the content. Usually, if it's a web page like aspx file, or ducument, they can open in a new tab. Some items are not supported by the browser, like MSG file you have mentioned, it will follow the protocol, download and open the related application.

About the 403 error you have mentioned, we might need more information to troubleshoot it. May I ask about what is the item that opens in the same tab so we could test from our side and analyze it?

Regards,

Alex