Wrap Each * on a Page Using jQuery

Question

I need to wrap each asterisks on a page with . The few things I\'ve tried don\'t work. I think what this boils down to is

Answer 1

This is a bit dirty and risky (explained below), but you could try the following:

var allHTML = $("body").html();
allHTML = allHTML.replace(/\*/g, "<span class=\"red\">*</span>");
$("body").html(allHTML);

http://jsfiddle.net/6rDK4/

Note: As Dogbert pointed out this might replace * characters that are within HTML tags, e.g. node attributes.

EDIT: Bear in mind that this might reattach all the scripts you have in your body though! Try replacing body with your main container.

EDIT2: VisioN posted a more elaborate but a lot safer solution.

Answer 2

This will work and not replace * in tags it shouldn't.

http://jsfiddle.net/DR6Ca/2/

var text = $("body").find(":contains(*)").contents().filter(function() {
    //Don't include css or script tags, all other text nodes are fine.
  return this.nodeType == 3
      && ($(this).parent().get(0).tagName.toUpperCase() !== "SCRIPT") 
      && ($(this).parent().get(0).tagName.toUpperCase() !== "STYLE");
}).replaceWith(function() {
   return this.textContent.replace(/\*/g, "<span class=\"red\">*</span>");

You can test the others code in this jsfiddle to see if they keep the "hi" blue or not. If it doesn't stay blue they have a bug.

Answer 3

Without using jQuery so it might be a little faster, and definitely not dependent on libs:

(function(str,e){
    var regex = new RegExp(str, 'gi');
    e.innerHTML = e.innerHTML.replace(regex, '<span class="red">*</span>');
})('*',document.body);

Answer 4

How about this?...

http://jsfiddle.net/n3Sqn/

 $("body:contains(*)").contents().each(function() {
  if(this.nodeType == 1)
  {
      $(this).html($(this).html().replace(/\*/g, "<span class=\"red\">*</span>"))
  }
});

Answer 5

For not replacing the entire HTML (really bad attitude), we can do fast manipulation with elements:

var specialTags = ["script", "style"].join("|"),
    re = new RegExp("^(?:" + specialTags + ")$", "i");

for (var els = document.getElementsByTagName("*"), i = els.length; i--;) {
    var el = els[i];

    if (re.test(el.tagName))
        continue;

    for (var j = 0, childs = el.childNodes, lj = childs.length; j < lj; j++) {
        var child = childs[j];
        if (child.nodeType === 3 && child.nodeValue.indexOf("*") > -1) {
            var segments = child.nodeValue.split("*");
            for (var k = 0, lk = segments.length; k < lk; k++) {
                el.insertBefore(document.createTextNode(segments[k]), child);
                if (k < lk - 1) {
                    var span = document.createElement("span");
                    span.className = "red";
                    span.appendChild(document.createTextNode("*"));
                    el.insertBefore(span, child);
                }
            }
            el.removeChild(child);
        }
    }
}

This is pure JavaScript which does not require jQuery, that can't really help here.

DEMO: http://jsfiddle.net/T4ZXA/5/