Plain Text Paste Cleaner

WHAT IT DOES

This tool intercepts paste events on input fields, textareas, and contenteditable elements, stripping away unwanted formatting such as bold, italic, colors, font sizes, and other rich text styling. It also removes non-printable characters, normalizes line endings, optionally collapses multiple spaces, and can strip or preserve line breaks based on your settings. A manual "Clean and Paste" button lets you clean already-copied text and paste it into the active field, or copy cleaned text to your clipboard for later use. An optional confirmation dialog shows you what will be pasted before the text is inserted.

WHERE IT RUNS

Runs on any website with input fields, textareas, or contenteditable regions—including word processors, email clients, CMS editors, forum post boxes, and social media platforms. It works with both native HTML elements and rich text editors built with React, Vue, or Angular. No per-site configuration needed.

HOW TO USE

Install the userscript via BotGentz, then simply paste (Ctrl+V) into any text field on any website. The tool automatically strips all formatting and inserts clean plain text. For already-copied text, click the "Clean and Paste" button in the panel to clean the clipboard contents and paste them into the active field. Customize the behavior via the settings panel: toggle whether to strip line breaks, preserve paragraphs (keep double line breaks), strip extra spaces, or show a confirmation dialog before each paste. Use the "Test Cleaner" button to see how the current settings affect a sample text.

TECHNICAL MECHANISM

The tool attaches a capturing event listener to the paste event on the document. This ensures it intercepts paste operations before any website's own handlers. When a paste occurs, it reads the plain text data from the clipboard event, applies the cleaning rules, and then prevents the default paste behavior. The cleaned text is then inserted at the cursor position. For contenteditable elements, it manipulates the DOM using the Selection API to insert a text node at the current range. For input and textarea elements, it replaces the selected range with the cleaned text and dispatches both "input" and "change" events to ensure React, Vue, and other frameworks update their state correctly. The manual "Clean and Paste" button uses the Clipboard API to read the clipboard, cleans the text, and then programmatically inserts it into the active field using the same insertion logic.

THE PANEL

The floating panel is built with BotGentz's BGPanel framework. It is draggable—click and drag the panel header to reposition it anywhere on screen. The panel remembers its position per site via the settings dropdown. It can be collapsed to a small bubble icon by clicking the minimize button, preserving screen space. The panel can be closed and reopened via the BotGentz toolbar. Press the Escape key to quickly close the panel. The panel automatically adjusts its layout for different screen sizes.

PLEASE NOTE

Requires the free BotGentz extension. This tool processes text entirely in your browser and does not send any data to external servers. It never reads from password, hidden, or file input fields. Websites change frequently; if the tool stops working on a particular site, the script may need updating. Settings are saved locally via GM_setValue and persist across page reloads. The tool does not modify clipboard contents permanently unless you use the "Clean and Paste" button—normal paste interception only affects the pasted text, not the clipboard itself.