You develop a custom masterpage and find that the browser windows title is empty, showing only…

” – Windows Internet Explorer”

Thanks to Martin Hatch the solution is simple and somewhat baffling – another SharePoint curveball.

The masterpage markup for the HTML -> HEAD -> TITLE element should be on a single line, and not spread over multiple lines;

Good

<title id="onetidTitle"><asp:ContentPlaceHolder id="PlaceHolderPageTitle" runat="server"></asp:ContentPlaceHolder></title>

Bad

<title id="onetidTitle">

    <asp:ContentPlaceHolder id="PlaceHolderPageTitle" runat="server"></asp:ContentPlaceHolder>

</title>