Get contentEditable caret index position

Question

I\'m finding tons of good, crossbrowser anwers on how to SET the cursor or caret index position in a contentEditable element, but none on how to GET or find its

Answer 1

As this took me forever to figure out using the new window.getSelection API I am going to share for posterity. Note that MDN suggests there is wider support for window.getSelection, however, your mileage may vary.

const getSelectionCaretAndLine = () => {
    // our editable div
    const editable = document.getElementById('editable');

    // collapse selection to end
    window.getSelection().collapseToEnd();

    const sel = window.getSelection();
    const range = sel.getRangeAt(0);

    // get anchor node if startContainer parent is editable
    let selectedNode = editable === range.startContainer.parentNode
      ? sel.anchorNode 
      : range.startContainer.parentNode;

    if (!selectedNode) {
        return {
            caret: -1,
            line: -1,
        };
    }

    // select to top of editable
    range.setStart(editable.firstChild, 0);

    // do not use 'this' sel anymore since the selection has changed
    const content = window.getSelection().toString();
    const text = JSON.stringify(content);
    const lines = (text.match(/\\n/g) || []).length + 1;

    // clear selection
    window.getSelection().collapseToEnd();

    // minus 2 because of strange text formatting
    return {
        caret: text.length - 2, 
        line: lines,
    }
} 

Here is a jsfiddle that fires on keyup. Note however, that rapid directional key presses, as well as rapid deletion seems to be skip events.