<div id="content">
hello how are you?
</div>

var count = document.getElementById('content').innerHTML.split(' ').length;

function get_text(el) {
    ret = "";
    var length = el.childNodes.length;
    for(var i = 0; i < length; i++) {
        var node = el.childNodes[i];
        if(node.nodeType != 8) {
            ret += node.nodeType != 1 ? node.nodeValue : get_text(node);
        }
    }
    return ret;
}
var words = get_text(document.getElementById('content'));
var count = words.split(' ').length;

var count = words.split(/s+/).length;

document.deepText= function(hoo){
    var A= [];
    if(hoo){
    	hoo= hoo.firstChild;
    	while(hoo!= null){
    		if(hoo.nodeType== 3){
    			A[A.length]= hoo.data;
    		}
    		else A= A.concat(arguments.callee(hoo));
    		hoo= hoo.nextSibling;
    	}
    }
    return A;
}

function countwords(hoo){
    var text= document.deepText(hoo).join(' ');
    return text.match(/[A-Za-z'-]+/g).length;
}
alert(countwords(document.body))

var count = !s ? 0 : (s.split(/^s+$/).length === 2 ? 0 : 2 +
    s.split(/s+/).length - s.split(/^s+/).length - s.split(/s+$/).length);

function CountWords (this_field, show_word_count, show_char_count) {
    if (show_word_count == null) {
        show_word_count = true;
    }
    if (show_char_count == null) {
        show_char_count = false;
    }
    var char_count = this_field.value.length;
    var fullStr = this_field.value + " ";
    var initial_whitespace_rExp = /^[^A-Za-z0-9]+/gi;
    var left_trimmedStr = fullStr.replace(initial_whitespace_rExp, "");
    var non_alphanumerics_rExp = rExp = /[^A-Za-z0-9]+/gi;
    var cleanedStr = left_trimmedStr.replace(non_alphanumerics_rExp, " ");
    var splitString = cleanedStr.split(" ");
    var word_count = splitString.length -1;
    if (fullStr.length <2) {
        word_count = 0;
    }
    if (word_count == 1) {
        wordOrWords = " word";
    } else {
        wordOrWords = " words";
    }
    if (char_count == 1) {
        charOrChars = " character";
    } else {
        charOrChars = " characters";
    }
    if (show_word_count & show_char_count) {
        alert ("Word Count:n" + "    " + word_count + wordOrWords + "n" + "    " + char_count + charOrChars);
    } else {
        if (show_word_count) {
            alert ("Word Count:  " + word_count + wordOrWords);
        } else {
            if (show_char_count) {
                alert ("Character Count:  " + char_count + charOrChars);
            }
        }
    }
    return word_count;
}