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Facebook is almost completely AJAX, and I'm aware in older browsers and IE9, Facebook uses the hash tag to rewrite unique URLs, like...



However, in Google Chrome and Firefox 4, Facebook is using something different, and rewriting to:



All completely in AJAX, modifying the URL and not even just whats after the hash tag (which never gets sent to the server.)

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It not because IE9 isn't modern, it is. Its because IE9 doesn't use web-kit; and why should they have to. –  user1086698 Dec 7 '11 at 23:22
That's not true. pushState is part of HTML5 and also Firefox is a Gecko browser. –  echeese Dec 8 '11 at 1:48

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up vote 4 down vote accepted

It is using the new HTML5 history API, in particular the history.pushState method.

It allows to change the path, query or fragment part of an URL.

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Which, of course, is only available in modern browsers and not IE9. –  Rob Apr 9 '11 at 12:18

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