Alternatives for using “#” in href attribute [duplicate]

Answer 1

nickf beat me to it; however, a few things should be mentioned. You should never use the "javascript" protocol for a link (unless maybe you intend for it to be a bookmarklet). It is the opposite of progressive enhancement. Whenever possible, the href attribute should be an actual URI resource so that it can gracefully degrade. In all other situations, "#" is encouraged and proper JavaScript should be used from preventing the page from scrolling to the top. There are two methods to do so. In the click handler, either prevent the default action, or return false.

$('a[rel*="popup"]').click(function(e) {
    e.preventDefault();
    loadPopup({url: this.href});
});

or

$('a[rel*="popup"]').click(function() {
    loadPopup({url: this.href});
    return false;
});