how to find a word in a web page

Question

Hello, I am wondering how to search a web browser document and highlight all occurrences of that word. I did come across a way of searching for the document .... 

Function SearchURL(ByVal URL As String, ByVal phrase As String) As String
        Dim wc As New Net.WebClient
        Dim WebString As String
        Dim Found As String = "Not Found"
        Dim idx As Integer
        Try
            WebString = wc.DownloadString(URL)
            idx = WebString.ToLower.IndexOf(phrase.ToLower)
            If idx > -1 Then
                Found = WebString.Substring(idx, phrase.Length)
            End If
        Catch ex As Exception
            MessageBox.Show(ex.ToString, "Error", MessageBoxButtons.OK, MessageBoxIcon.Error)
        End Try
        wc.Dispose()
        Return Found
    End Function
 
    Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Button1.Click
        Label1.Text = SearchURL("http://www.google.com", "Google")

which i could easily manipulate to say like "we found this many occurrences of the word such and such in the web page." But i would just like to know how to highlight those words. thanks in advance (:

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"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit." Aristotle

Answer 1

Hello there! I've been handling this for quite a long time now. Hope someone in there could help.

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Answer 2

Hi Foster,

Welcome to the MSDN forum.

According to your description, you’d like to highlights words in WebBrowser Control. One way to achieve your goal is get HTML codes of web pages and then search the specified words, and then change the CSS of the words. Please try the following steps:

1.      Add a reference to Microsoft.mshtml , on my PC its location is “C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft.NET\Primary Interop Assemblies\Microsoft.mshtml.dll”
2.      Imports mshtml and System.Text
3.      Add a button and a  WebBrowser Control and paste the following codes

 Public Class Form1
    Private Sub webBrowser1_DocumentCompleted(sender As Object, e As WebBrowserDocumentCompletedEventArgs) Handles WebBrowser1.DocumentCompleted
        Dim doc2 As IHTMLDocument2 = TryCast(WebBrowser1.Document.DomDocument, IHTMLDocument2)
        Dim html As New StringBuilder(doc2.body.outerHTML)
        Dim words = New String() {"Visual Basic", "minutes"}
        For Each key As String In words
            Dim substitution As String = "<span style='background-color: rgb(255, 255, 0);'>" & key & "</span>"
            html.Replace(key, substitution)
        Next
        doc2.body.innerHTML = html.ToString()
    End Sub
    Private Sub Button1_Click(sender As Object, e As EventArgs) Handles Button1.Click
        WebBrowser1.Navigate("http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vbgeneral/threads")
        AddHandler WebBrowser1.DocumentCompleted, AddressOf webBrowser1_DocumentCompleted
    End Sub
End Class

If anything is unclear, please feel free and feedback.

Best regards, 

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Shanks Zen
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