Q:

jQuery select  tags and wrap spaces around it

For example I have this markup:
Test text<br>
test2 text

That  inside it needs to have a space before, and after. Like this 
" <br> " 

So I can split the whole text and get a complete list like this:
Test
text
<br>
test2
text

I do the splitting with this code:
var words = text.split(" ");
    //            console.log("words:" + words);
for ( var i = 0, l = words.length; i<l; ++i ) {
    //  console.log(i +": "+words[i] );
}

I have some code to answer my question.  Not complete yet, I need your help.
// Replace all "<br>" to " <br> "             
$("#artikel br").each(function(){
   alert($(this).index()));
});

A:

$("#artikel").html(function(index, oldhtml){
    return oldhtml.replace(/\<br\>/gi, "&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;"); 
});

html docs
Live DEMO

