Regex remove escape characters javascript

I have this var

var x = "
";

Which is

But I need

How can I "unescape" this var to remove all escaping characters?

asked Jul 10, 2011 at 9:50

You can replace a backslash followed by a quote with just a quote via a regular expression and the String#replace function:

var x = "
";
x = x.replace(/\\"/g, '"');
document.body.appendChild(
  document.createTextNode("After: " + x)
);

Note that the regex just looks for one backslash; there are two in the literal because you have to escape backslashes in regular expression literals with a backslash (just like in a string literal).

The g at the end of the regex tells replace to work throughout the string ("global"); otherwise, it would replace only the first match.

answered Jul 10, 2011 at 9:53

T.J. CrowderT.J. Crowder

982k181 gold badges1827 silver badges1800 bronze badges

0

You can use JSON.parse to unescape slashes:

function unescapeSlashes(str) {
  // add another escaped slash if the string ends with an odd
  // number of escaped slashes which will crash JSON.parse
  let parsedStr = str.replace(/(^|[^\\])(\\\\)*\\$/, "$&\\");

  // escape unescaped double quotes to prevent error with
  // added double quotes in json string
  parsedStr = parsedStr.replace(/(^|[^\\])((\\\\)*")/g, "$1\\$2");

  try {
    parsedStr = JSON.parse(`"${parsedStr}"`);
  } catch(e) {
    return str;
  }
  return parsedStr ;
}

answered Feb 18, 2018 at 19:45

Tony BrixTony Brix

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6

If you want to remove backslash escapes, but keep escaped backslashes, here's what you can do:

"a\\b\\\\c\\\\\\\\\\d".replace(/(?:\\(.))/g, '$1');

Results in: ab\c\\d.

Explanation of replace(/(?:\\(.))/g, '$1'):

/(?:\\) is a non-capturing group to capture the leading backslash

/(.) is a capturing group to capture what's following the backslash

/g global matching: Find all matches, not just the first.

$1 is referencing the content of the first capturing group (what's following the backslash).

answered Aug 9, 2019 at 12:42

BrixomaticBrixomatic

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1

Try this:

x = x.replace(/\\/g, "");

answered Jul 10, 2011 at 9:53

ElonU WebdevElonU Webdev

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1

var x = "
";
alert(x.replace(/\\/gi, ''));

answered Jul 10, 2011 at 9:54

Alex EmilovAlex Emilov

1,2133 gold badges18 silver badges25 bronze badges

2

'
'.replace(/\\\"/g, '"')

Other answers have you delete all backslashes, you only want to delete the ones befoew the quotes.

answered Sep 11, 2017 at 6:58

Aryeh ArmonAryeh Armon

2,1102 gold badges21 silver badges36 bronze badges

You need to make there be one backslash instead of three.
Like this:

var x = "
";        

answered Dec 29, 2013 at 14:11

Let me propose this variant:

function un(v) { eval('v = "'+v+'"'); return v; }

This function will not simply remove slashes. Text compiles as code, and in case correct input, you get right unescaping result for any escape sequence.

answered Feb 11, 2013 at 21:53

2

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