read characters and words in HTML text using javascript

Question

consider that i am getting a HTML format string and want to read the number of words & characters, Consider, i am getting,

var HTML =  '<p>BODY&nbsp;Article By Archie(Used By Story Tool)</p>';

now i want to get number of words and characters

above html will look like:

BODY Article By Archie(Used By Story Tool)

IMPORTANT

i want to avoid html tags while counting words or character
avoid keywords like ** ** etc..
Ex. words and character should be counted of : (for current example)
BODY Article By Archie(Used By Story Tool)

please help,
Thank You.

Jon Benedicto · Accepted Answer · 2009-12-16 14:37:32Z

3

To give an example for adamantium's suggestion:

var e = document.createElement("span");
e.innerHTML = '<p>BODY&nbsp;Article By Archie(Used By Story Tool)</p>';
var text = e.textContent || e.innerText;

var characterCount = text.length;
var wordCount = text.split(/[\s\.\(\),]+/).length;

Update: Added other word-stop characters

edited Dec 16, 2009 at 14:37

answered Dec 16, 2009 at 6:36

Jon Benedicto

10.6k3 gold badges31 silver badges31 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

4 Comments

dexter Over a year ago

thanks for replying i have following query: the words can be separated by: blank space, fullstop,comma,opening round bracket(,closing round bracket ), dot . ,etc how that can be done the above code is giving 9 word count it should be 8 i guess pls reply

dexter Over a year ago

your earlier example worked with K Primes idea of using .match() of regExp ,anyways. thanks for reply

dexter Over a year ago

and can you please tell how to identify number(digit) an same example ie e.innerHTML ='<p>Super By My 4 Story</p>'; i want to ignore digit from word count

Jon Benedicto Over a year ago

to eliminate numeric sections, you'd use something like: /\s+[0-9]+\s+|[\s\.\(\),]+/

rahul · Accepted Answer · 2009-12-16 06:34:18Z

2

Use a hidden HTML element that can render text like span or p
Assign the string to the innerHTML of the hidden element.
Count the characters using length property of innerText/textContent.

To read the word count you can

Split the innerText/textContent using empty space
Get the length of the returned array.

edited Dec 16, 2009 at 6:34

answered Dec 16, 2009 at 6:27

rahul

188k50 gold badges239 silver badges266 bronze badges

3 Comments

K Prime Over a year ago

Instead of split, I'd recommend using RegExp to take into account non-space breaks - for example, text.match(/\b\w/g).length

Annie Over a year ago

Note that split() can also take a regular expression as an argument: developer.mozilla.org/En/Core_JavaScript_1.5_Reference/Objects/…

dexter Over a year ago

and can you please tell how to identify number(digit) an same example ie e.innerHTML ='<p>Super By My 4 Story</p>'; i want to ignore digit from word count

EFreak · Accepted Answer · 2009-12-16 06:29:55Z

0

Algorithm:

Sweep through the entire html
Perform regex replaces
- replace <.*> (regex for anyting tat stays withing <>)by nothing
- replace /&nbsp/ by nothing
tip: can be done by replace function in javascript. hunt on w3schools.com

Now you have the clutter out!

then perform a simple word/character count

answered Dec 16, 2009 at 6:29

EFreak

3,3193 gold badges31 silver badges31 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

read characters and words in HTML text using javascript

3 Answers 3

4 Comments

3 Comments

Algorithm:

Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

3 Answers 3

4 Comments

3 Comments

Algorithm:

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related