basic javascript question

[drdebate]

I found a little bit of javascript that I have tweaked over the years but now I have a tweak that I don't know how to design. The javascript below displays two boxes allowing the user to quickly search any one of a number of search engines. As present, location.href is used to assign the search results to the current frame/window. What I would like is the results to appear in a new browser window, like Target="_blank". I have done some research and it would appear that if I could replace location.href with window.open, I would get what I want. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
<SCRIPT>
<!-- hide this script from non-JavaScript browsers
var MAX_ENGINES = 75;
var SNARK_STRING = "hunting+the+snark";
function MakeArray(n) {
for (var i = 1; i <= n; i++) {
this[i] = 0;
}
this.maxlen = n;
this.len = 0;
return this;
}
var engs = new MakeArray(MAX_ENGINES);
function find_substring(needle, haystack) {
var i, needlen = needle.length, haylen = haystack.length;
for (i=0; i<=haylen-needlen; i++) {
if (needle == haystack.substring(i,i+needlen))
return i;
}
return false;
}
function Engine(name, opts, home, search) {
var snark = find_substring(SNARK_STRING, search);
this.name = name;
this.opts = opts;
this.home = home;
this.pre_snark = search.substring(0,snark);
this.post_snark= search.substring(snark+SNARK_STRING.length, search.length);
}
function Add(name, opts, home, search) {
engs.len++;
if (engs.len <= engs.maxlen) {
engs[engs.len] = new Engine(name, opts, home, search)
}
else {
alert("Better increase MAX_ENGINES: " + engs.len + ">" + engs.maxlen)
}
}
Add("Google", "SELECTED",
"http://www.google.com",
"http://www.google.com/search?q=hunting+the+snark");
Add("MSN", "",
"http://www.msn.com",
"http://search.msn.com/results.asp?RS=CHECKED&FORM=MSNH&v=1&q=hunting+the+snark")
Add("Yahoo", "",
"http://www.yahoo.com",
"http://search.yahoo.com/search?o=1&p=hunting+the+snark&d=y&za=default&h=s&g=0&n=10");
Add("Lycos", "",
"http://www.lycos.com/",
"http://search.lycos.com/main/default.asp?lpv=1&loc=searchhp&query=hunting+the+snark" );
Add("Altavista", "",
"http://www.altavista.com/",
"http://www.altavista.com/sites/search/web?q=hunting+the+snark" );
Add("Metacrawler", "",
"http://www.metacrawler.com/",
"http://search.metacrawler.com/texis/search?brand=metacrawler&q=hunting+the+snark" );
Add("Ask Jeeves", "",
"http://www.ask.com/",
"http://www.ask.com/main/askjeeves.asp?ask=hunting+the+snark" );
function HandleForm(form) {
form.submit();
var i, oldq=form.query.value, newq="";
for (i=0; i<oldq.length; i++) { // compress [ ]+ into \+
var thischar = oldq.charAt(i);
if (thischar != ' ')
newq += thischar;
else if (lastchar != ' ')
newq += '+';
lastchar = thischar;
}
var eng = engs[1+form.service.selectedIndex];
location.href = newq ? eng.pre_snark + newq + eng.post_snark : eng.home;
}
function DisplayForm() {
document.writeln('<FORM OnSubmit="HandleForm(this); return false">Search the web with&nbsp;');
document.writeln('<SELECT name="service">');
for (i=1; i <= engs.len; i++) {
document.writeln("<OPTION " + engs[i].opts + "> " + engs[i].name);
}
document.writeln('</SELECT> &nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;<INPUT size=25 name="query">&nbsp;&nbsp;');
document.writeln('<input type=submit value=" Search">');
document.writeln('<input type=reset value=" Reset">');
document.writeln('</FORM>');
}
DisplayForm();
</SCRIPT>

[Khalid Ali]

you are right,
window.open("new url",'');

should open a new window