Question

If I have a google doc with styling (bold, underline, etc), is there a way to parse the formatting with Javascript? I am trying to make an extremely simple WYSWIG -> HTML formatter, and easily was able to substitute whitespace with HTML, but am having a harder time with formatting.

TL/DR: If I copy and paste from a Google Doc to a textarea, can I use Javascript to see what the formatting was?

Answer 1

Instead of using a textbox, which will remove all formatting, you can use HTML5’s contenteditable property.

<div id="editable" contenteditable="true">
edit me
</div>

If you paste something into that box, it will preserve formatting. Now you can use jQuery’s .html() to get the HTML of the container.

$("#editable").html()

Demo