Retrieving the HTML source code

Geno Carman

4.19/5 (17 votes)

Dec 1, 2004

116444

An article on how to retrieve the full source code of a web page.

Introduction

An app I was writing needed to store the full HTML of a web page. I looked all over the web and the MSDN library on how to get the complete HTML from a CHtmlView. I found out how to get the <BODY></BODY> data, but not how to get the <HTML></HTML> data. After lots of stumbling, I hit on the following very simple technique.

Examples of getting the outer HTML of the <BODY> tag abound. While exploring the IHTMLDocument2 interface, I noticed the get_ParentElement method. I realized that the parent of <BODY> is <HTML>.

This function took care of my problem:

bool CMyHtmlView::GetDocumentHTML(CString &str)
{
    IHTMLDocument2 *lpHtmlDocument = NULL;
    LPDISPATCH lpDispatch = NULL;

    lpDispatch = GetHtmlDocument();
    if(!lpDispatch)
        return false;

    lpDispatch->QueryInterface(IID_IHTMLDocument2, (void**)&lpHtmlDocument);
    ASSERT(lpHtmlDocument);
    lpDispatch->Release();

    IHTMLElement *lpBodyElm;
    IHTMLElement *lpParentElm;

    lpHtmlDocument->get_body(&lpBodyElm);
    ASSERT(lpBodyElm);
    lpHtmlDocument->Release();
    // get_body returns all between <BODY> and </BODY>. 
    // I need all between <HTML> and </HTML>.

    // the parent of BODY is HTML
    lpBodyElm->get_parentElement(&lpParentElm);
    ASSERT(lpParentElm);
    BSTR    bstr;
    lpParentElm->get_outerHTML(&bstr);
    str = bstr;

    lpParentElm->Release();
    lpBodyElm->Release();

    return true;
}

Points of Interest

There is bound to be a better way of doing this. If you know it, please share it with me.