Javascript: How to retrieve text from a webpage

Question

I want to retrieve the text within a webpage as a string. Is this possible? I am new to Javascript.

For example:

var url = "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programming";
var result = url.getText();  <---- stores text as a string
document.write(result);

How do I write the getText method? Ether the entire HTML source code (which I can use to get the text) or just the text. I would like to do this from within a web browser.

I tried this and I am able to get an index number:

var url = "http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=cat&page=2";
var result;
function go(){
    result = url.search(/cat/i);
    document.write(result);
}

This gives me an index of 44. That means that reading a page is possible. Can I do the opposite and enter the index to retrieve the text?

Are you looking to do this inside a web browser or from a server-side JS engine like Node.js or Rhino? — psema4
– psema4, Commented Nov 3, 2012 at 2:07
In order to get around the cross-domain issue, is running a proxy service a possibility? — psema4
– psema4, Commented Nov 3, 2012 at 2:31

psema4 · Accepted Answer · 2012-11-03 03:06:35Z

3

If the Ajax/Cross-Domain situation is not an issue for you, you can extract the text of a web page with

var el = document.body; // or some other element reference
var text = el.innerText || el.textContent;

If you need to read text from pages in the same domain as your application, you can use Ajax directly.

If you need to read text from pages outside of your domain, you'll have to jump through a few extra hoops like setting up a proxy server or dealing with CORS - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-origin_resource_sharing

answered Nov 3, 2012 at 3:06

psema4

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Comments

Danny Hong · Accepted Answer · 2012-11-03 02:10:58Z

1

Ajax won't support cross domain. You need server side language.

answered Nov 3, 2012 at 2:10

Danny Hong

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Comments

Rayshawn · Accepted Answer · 2012-11-03 02:20:21Z

1

You would be better off using a more powerful server-side language to do that, not JavaScript. Python or PHP would be decent choices.

edited Nov 3, 2012 at 2:20

answered Nov 3, 2012 at 2:08

Rayshawn

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4 Comments

psema4 Over a year ago

JavaScript is also a server side language; see also en.wikipedia.org/wiki/…

Rayshawn Over a year ago

Yes, but that's not the best option for parsing the HTML, Python would be much better, IMHO.

psema4 Over a year ago

I used to do this in Perl, now I do it in Node.js - NPM has plenty of modules that are relevant. One day I'll actually sit down and learn Python :)

Qwertyfshag Over a year ago

I really want to do it within a browser. Would a browser extention work?

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