Looking for a better workaround to Chrome select on focus bug

Question

I have the same problem as the user in this question, which is due to this bug in Webkit. However, the workaround provided will not work for my app. Let me re-state the problem so that you don't have to go read another question:

I am trying to select all the text in a textarea when it gets focus. The following jQuery code works in IE/FF/Opera:

$('#out').focus(function(){
  $('#out').select();
});

However, in Chrome/Safari the text is selected--very briefly--but then the mouseUp event is fired and the text is deselected. The following workaround is offered in the above links:

$('#out').mouseup(function(e){
  e.preventDefault();
});

However, this workaround is no good for me. I want to select all text only when the user gives the textarea focus. He must then be able to select only part of the text if he chooses. Can anyone think of a workaround that still meets this requirement?

Answer 1

How about this?

$('#out').focus(function () {
    $('#out').select().mouseup(function (e) {
        e.preventDefault();
        $(this).unbind("mouseup");
    });
});

Answer 2

The accepted answer (and basically every other solution I found so far) does not work with keyboard focus, i. e. pressing tab, at least not in my Chromium 21. I use the following snippet instead:

$('#out').focus(function () {
  $(this).select().one('mouseup', function (e) {
    $(this).off('keyup');
    e.preventDefault();
  }).one('keyup', function () {
    $(this).select().off('mouseup');
  });
});

e.preventDefault() in the keyup or focus handler does not help, so the unselecting after a keyboard focus seems to not happen in their default handlers, but rather somewhere between the focus and keyup events.

As suggested by @BarelyFitz, it might be better to work with namespaced events in order to not accidentally unbind other event handlers. Replace 'keyup' with 'keyup.selectText' and 'mouseup' with 'mouseup.selectText' for that.

Answer 3

Why not simply:

$('#out').focus(function(){
    $(this).one('mouseup', function() {
        $(this).select();
    });
});

Seems to work in all major browsers...

Answer 4

A very slightly different approach would be to separate the focus event from the mouse sequence. This works really nicely for me - no state variables, no leaked handlers, no inadvertent removal of handlers, and it works with click, tab, or programmatic focus. Code and jsFiddle below -

$('#out').focus(function() {
    $(this).select();
});
$('#out').on('mousedown.selectOnFocus', function() {
    if (!($(this).is(':focus'))) {
        $(this).focus();
        $(this).one('mouseup.selectOnFocus', function(up) {
            up.preventDefault();
        });
    }
});

https://jsfiddle.net/tpankake/eob9eb26/27/

Answer 5

onclick="var self = this;setTimeout(function() {self.select();}, 0);"

Answer 6

Select the text before putting the focus on the input box.

$('#out').select().focus();

Answer 7

Make a bool. Set it to true after a focus event and reset it after a mouse up event. During the mouse up, if it's true, you know the user just selected the text field; therefore you know you must prevent the mouse up from happening. Otherwise, you must let it pass.

var textFieldGotFocus = false;

$('#out').focus(function()
{
    $('#out').select();
    textFieldGotFocus = true;
});

$('#out').mouseup(function(e)
{
    if (textFieldGotFocus)
        e.preventDefault();
});

$(document).mouseup(function() { textFieldGotFocus = false; });

It's important that you put the mouseup listener that resets the variable on document, since it's not guaranteed that the user will release the mouse button over the text field.

Answer 8

digitalfresh's solution is mostly there, but has a bug in that if you manually trigger .focus() using JS (so not using a click), or if you tab to the field, then you get an unwanted mouseup event bound - this causes the first click that should deselect the text to be ignored.

To solve:

var out = $('#out');
var mouseCurrentlyDown = false;

out.focus(function () {
  out.select();

  if (mouseCurrentlyDown) {
    out.one('mouseup', function (e) {
      e.preventDefault();
    });  
  }
}).mousedown(function() {
  mouseCurrentlyDown = true;
});

$('body').mouseup(function() {
  mouseCurrentlyDown = false;
});

Note: The mouseup event should be on body and not the input as we want to account for the user mousedown-ing within the input, moving the mouse out of the input, and then mouseup-ing.

Answer 9

tpankake's answer converted to a reusable jQuery function..
(If you upvote this, please also upvote his answer)

Load the following AFTER loading the jQuery library:

$.fn.focusSelect = function () {
    return this.each(function () {
        var me = $(this);
        me.focus(function () {
            $(this).select();
        });
        me.on('mousedown.selectOnFocus', function () {
            var me2 = $(this);
            if (me2.is(':focus') === false) {
                me2.focus();
                me2.one('mouseup.selectOnFocus', function (up) {
                    up.preventDefault();
                });
            }
        });
    });
};

Use it like this:

$(document).ready(function () {
    // apply to all inputs on the page:
    $('input[type=text]').focusSelect();

    // apply only to one input
    $('#out').focusSelect();
});