Getting HtmlDocument from string without using browser control

Question

I obtain a webpage's html code (as a string) using a WebClient.

However I want to turn it into an HtmlDocument object so I can use the DOM features this class offers. Currently the only way I know how to do it - is using a Browser control as follows:

            string pageHtml = client.DownloadString(url);

            browser.ScriptErrorsSuppressed = true;

            browser.DocumentText = pageHtml;

            do
            {
                Application.DoEvents();

            } while (browser.ReadyState != WebBrowserReadyState.Complete);

            return browser.Document;

Is there another way of doing it? I know there are other browser controls avaliable, but is there a simpler way?

score 7 · Accepted Answer · edited Nov 24 '17 at 20:33

7

You can use HtmlAgilityPack .... For example:

HtmlAgilityPack.HtmlDocument doc = new HtmlAgilityPack.HtmlDocument();
doc.LoadHtml(html);

var results = doc.DocumentNode
    .Descendants("div")
    .Select(n => n.InnerText);

edited Nov 24 '17 at 20:33

carla

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answered May 17 '12 at 09:41

L.B

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I will consider that, however I already have a lot of code which uses the HtmlDocument class, and I was more looking for something I could plug-in without needing to change everything. – Aabela May 17 '12 at 09:46

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 30 '15 at 19:30

I know this is an old post but my repl is for others who come here like me

If you want to do it using code .NET here is what you have to do

public System.Windows.Forms.HtmlDocument GetHtmlDocument(string html)
        {
            WebBrowser browser = new WebBrowser();
            browser.ScriptErrorsSuppressed = true;
            browser.DocumentText = html;
            browser.Document.OpenNew(true);
            browser.Document.Write(html);
            browser.Refresh();
            return browser.Document;
        }

score 0 · Answer 3 · edited Apr 16 '17 at 18:01

I Know it is an old topic, my solution:

public static class HtmlHelpr{

        public static HtmlDocument HtmlDocumentFromFile(this string PathToHtml){
            using(WebBrowser wb = new WebBrowser()){            
                string s = File.ReadAllText(PathToHtml);
                wb.ScriptErrorsSuppressed = true;
                wb.DocumentText = s;
                var hd = wb.Document;
                hd.Write(s);
                return  hd;
            }
        }
    }

Getting HtmlDocument from string without using browser control

3 Answers3

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