Replacing selected text in a textarea

Hi,

I need help replacing text in a textarea, specifically creating a link tag around a piece of text (Exactly like the "insert link" button on this page)

I've had trouble finding a cross-browser solution, but so far I can select the text successfully but just can't figure out how to replace it:

function insert_link(){

		var linktext;
		var txtarea = document.getElementById('newstext');
		
		linktext = (txtarea.value).substring(txtarea.selectionStart,txtarea.selectionEnd);  

		if (linktext == '')
		{
			alert("Please select some text for your link");
		}
		else
		{
			var linkurl = window.prompt('Please enter the URL of the link', 'http://');
			
			var htmllink = "<a href='" + linkurl + "'>" + linktext + "</a>";
			
                        //How do I insert the html back into the textarea?
		}
	}

Code (markup):

Thanks for your help

 

Are you trying to replace, or append?

 

Just want to wrap html tags around some text:

So replace this:

Link Text

with this:

<a href='http://www.link.com'>Link Text</a>

 

See this page www dot massless dot org/mozedit/
There you can find cross browser textarea editor and answer to your question.

 

thanks bosko, that did it!