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Search in XML.

  • 5 replies
  • 9 have this problem
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  • Last reply by bajhn

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The text search in an XML file does not work correctly. When pressing Ctrl-F and searching for some text which is present in the XML file, Firefox will report it has not found anything.

The text search in an XML file does not work correctly. When pressing Ctrl-F and searching for some text which is present in the XML file, Firefox will report it has not found anything.

Chosen solution

You can do a search in the page source if searching the XML tree view isn't working.

  • Firefox > Web Developer > Page Source
  • Tools > Web Developer > Page Source (Ctrl+U)
  • Right-click on a web page to open the right-click context menu and select Page Source
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All Replies (5)

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In the Find Bar, un-check "Match case" if it is checked


If this reply solves your problem, please click "Solved It" next to this reply when signed-in to the forum.



Not related to your question, but...

You may need to update some plug-ins. Check your plug-ins and update as necessary:

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Thanks SafeBrowser, I have tried it again and it is not working even "Match Case" is unchecked. Take http://edition.cnn.com/sitemap_news.xml for example, 1> Press Ctrl-F. 2> Input cnn and hit enter to search. 3> The next button in the search bar works well, but if you click the "Previous" or "Highlight all" button, it just doesn't work.

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Just found an old bug related to the issue --> https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=517866

There are other related bug reports, but one of the suggestions in the above worked for me.

  • Select (highlight) a few letters in the xml doc, then deselect (click in a blank space), then find what you want. However, "Highlight all" will not work.

Older bug report, with more recent comments and other duplicate reports listed --> https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=263049#c32

Sorry, but there does not seem to be a fix. I suppose fixing the issue is a low priority item with the developers.


If this reply solves your problem, please click "Solved It" next to this reply when signed-in to the forum.

Modified by SafeBrowser

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Chosen Solution

You can do a search in the page source if searching the XML tree view isn't working.

  • Firefox > Web Developer > Page Source
  • Tools > Web Developer > Page Source (Ctrl+U)
  • Right-click on a web page to open the right-click context menu and select Page Source
more options

I have this problem in Firefox 11.0 for Linux Mint 12. When I opened a local file foo.xml and searched for "clientip" with the Match case box unchecked, the ^F search didn't find tag <clientIP>. It did, however, find "clientIP".