Unescaping strings in c# using string.Replace?

Question

I have a collection of strings within a checkListBox and I convert this collection into a List<string>. During this conversion I can only imagine the strings are escaped due to them being in the below format:

<category title="FOO">

This then becomes

"<category title=\"FOO\">

I need to unescape these strings for comparison, and I've tried something like

 s.Replace(@"\""", @""""); <-------- trying to replace all \" with "

Is this even possible? And if so what's the correct way of removing slashes from quotes in a string?

score 31 · Accepted Answer · answered Jun 17 '16 at 14:35

31

You can use Unescape

    var str = "<category title=\"FOO\">";
    var result = System.Text.RegularExpressions.Regex.Unescape(str);
    Console.WriteLine(result); //<category title="FOO">

    Console.ReadLine();

answered Jun 17 '16 at 14:35

3615

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4

this does not work on double quote character " – Aaron. S Jun 09 '22 at 21:38
this does not work, I want to call ffmpeg.exe which see stupid microsoft weird conventions \"c:\\path\\file.txt\" – Meryan Apr 01 '23 at 08:54

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 17 '16 at 14:35

2

You can use Regex.Unescape Method to resolve. https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.text.regularexpressions.regex.unescape(v=vs.110).aspx

Or you can use Uri.UnescapeDataString Method.

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-in/library/system.uri.unescapedatastring(v=vs.110).aspx

answered Jun 17 '16 at 14:35

Jignesh Patel

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http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2661169/how-can-i-unescape-and-reescape-strings-in-net – Jignesh Patel Jun 17 '16 at 14:39

score -1 · Answer 3 · answered Jun 17 '16 at 14:33

-1

Try Replace("\\"", "\""), or even better Replace("\", "")

answered Jun 17 '16 at 14:33

Eugene

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Just realised that the string doesn't contain a closing tag, so your second suggestion would work providing the slash doesn't interfere with the second quote (which it does unfortunately) – Bradley Jun 17 '16 at 14:35

Unescaping strings in c# using string.Replace?

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