contenteditable, set caret at the end of the text (cross-browser)

The following function will do it in all major browsers:

function placeCaretAtEnd(el) {
    el.focus();
    if (typeof window.getSelection != "undefined"
            && typeof document.createRange != "undefined") {
        var range = document.createRange();
        range.selectNodeContents(el);
        range.collapse(false);
        var sel = window.getSelection();
        sel.removeAllRanges();
        sel.addRange(range);
    } else if (typeof document.body.createTextRange != "undefined") {
        var textRange = document.body.createTextRange();
        textRange.moveToElementText(el);
        textRange.collapse(false);
        textRange.select();
    }
}

placeCaretAtEnd( document.querySelector('p') );

p{ padding:.5em; border:1px solid black; }

<p contentEditable>foo bar </p>

Placing the caret at the start is almost identical: it just requires changing the Boolean passed into the calls to collapse(). Here’s an example that creates functions for placing the caret at the start and at the end:

function createCaretPlacer(atStart) {
    return function(el) {
        el.focus();
        if (typeof window.getSelection != "undefined"
                && typeof document.createRange != "undefined") {
            var range = document.createRange();
            range.selectNodeContents(el);
            range.collapse(atStart);
            var sel = window.getSelection();
            sel.removeAllRanges();
            sel.addRange(range);
        } else if (typeof document.body.createTextRange != "undefined") {
            var textRange = document.body.createTextRange();
            textRange.moveToElementText(el);
            textRange.collapse(atStart);
            textRange.select();
        }
    };
}

var placeCaretAtStart = createCaretPlacer(true);
var placeCaretAtEnd = createCaretPlacer(false);