How to decode encoded special XML characters in a string?

Question

I was given a string like

example.com/test?region=us&amp;lang=en&amp;jurisdiction=us

How can I write the java code to decode the encoded characters like

&amp;

in the string. Is there any existing class/method to decode them?

Thanks.

Indeed, those are escaped HTML/XML entities. They needs to be unescaped. — BalusC, Feb 11 '10 at 02:27

score 25 · Accepted Answer · edited May 02 '13 at 20:42

25

To unescape HTML/XML entities, use Apache Commons Lang StringEscapeUtils or homegrow one.

edited May 02 '13 at 20:42

yegor256

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answered Feb 11 '10 at 02:29

BalusC

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Homegrowing your own is probably a bad idea; use the Apache library. – seansand Dec 22 '11 at 16:38
2

@sean: even more, homegrowing is always a bad idea. The link is just there to show how it could be done, for the interested or for ones who have a stupid manager who decided a "no 3rd party libraries" restriction. – BalusC Dec 22 '11 at 16:50
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I really disagree on the "always a bad idea" part. I have really a problem if someone uses external libraries only to use a few functions. Let alone the version management if (always apache) libraries clashes. – Waverick Feb 18 '16 at 11:04
@Waverick: I agree your disagreement. – BalusC Feb 18 '16 at 11:05

score 2 · Answer 2 · edited Nov 24 '13 at 16:12

2

StringEscapeUtils seems to escape everything

edited Nov 24 '13 at 16:12

andrebask

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answered Jun 17 '11 at 16:46

Jaime Hablutzel

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score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Nov 10 '15 at 16:49

0

You can also include special characters in XPL. XPL has exactly the same structure as XML, but allows special characters. There is an XML parser with source code available for transformations at http://hll.nu

answered Nov 10 '15 at 16:49

Roger F. Gay

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How to decode encoded special XML characters in a string?

3 Answers3

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