title: Validating TinyMCE for empty inputs
body: <p>I use TinyMCE as a very effective WYSIWYG editor.</p>
  
  <p>There are no problems with the editor functionally. The problem comes when trying to determine if its empty.</p>
  
  <hr>
  
  <h2>Problem</h2>
  
  <p>I need to validate the input of the TinyMCE textarea to ensure that something has been entered before I submit the form. </p>
  
  <h2>What I have tried</h2>
  
  <p>I have discovered on <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/8749179/how-do-i-validate-a-tinymce-editor-if-it-is-blank-by-appending-a-string-next-to">this</a> question that users have had success with this using the following statement</p>
  
  <pre><code>var editorContent = tinyMCE.get('tinyeditor').getContent();
  if (editorContent == '')
  {
      // Editor empty
  }
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>For me there is a problem with this because instead of returning an empty string, the string returned looks like this (While empty):</p>
  
  <pre><code>"&lt;!DOCTYPE html&gt;↵&lt;html&gt;↵&lt;head&gt;↵&lt;/head&gt;↵&lt;body&gt;↵↵&lt;/body&gt;↵&lt;/html&gt;"
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I even tried evaluating the string like this</p>
  
  <pre><code>if (editorContent == "&lt;!DOCTYPE html&gt;↵&lt;html&gt;↵&lt;head&gt;↵&lt;/head&gt;↵&lt;body&gt;↵↵&lt;/body&gt;↵&lt;/html&gt;")
  {
      // Editor empty
  }
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>But it doesnt pick it up</p>
  
  <h2>Code so far</h2>
  
  <pre><code>function validateForm()
  {
      var editorContent = tinyMCE.get('editor').getContent();
      if (editorContent == "" || editorContent == null)
      {
          // Add error message if not already present
          if (!$('#editor-error-message').length)
          {
              $('&lt;span id="editor-error-message"&gt;Editor empty&lt;/span&gt;').insertAfter($(tinyMCE.get('editor').getContainer()));
          }
      }
      else
      {
          // Remove error message
          if ($('#editor-error-message'))
              $('#editor-error-message').remove();
  
          document.getElementById('submit').submit();
      }
  }
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Has something changed in TinyMCE? What am i missing?</p>