Bug 304143 – Adding an empty span to an otherwise empty editable element, makes the element unselectable

• Status: NEW
• Component: HTML Editing

CONTEXT: As an editor developer I need a way to position popovers relative to a collapsed cursor. That's why I'm rendering an additional span at the cursor position with an anchor-name, so I can use CSS anchor positioning to position a popover/prompt (e.g. for adding a new link).

BUG: With the extra span in place, in Safari the field(s) are no longer selectable.
In Chrome and Firefox it works just fine.

See Repro: https://w3c.github.io/editing/repros/516.html

Please read the original issue/discussion for context: https://github.com/w3c/editing/issues/516

W3C Editing TF Call 2025-12-11:

> 08:24 johanneswilm: Michael will upload a video. we'll keep the Agenda+ and see if we have an idea for a cleaner solution
> 08:24 Michael: ideally — would want to anchor to the selection
> 08:24 (similar to how you want to anchor to a DOM node)
> 08:25 johanneswilm: might take a while to develop exactly what CSS anchor positioning relative to selection would look like. seems interesting to pursue
> 08:25 johanneswilm: let's see if opacity: 0 is a viable workaround