CODEWITHSUNDEEP
javaurl
Frank
Frank

Reputation: 31086

What is a good way to parse parameters in a Url with a "&" char as a value?

In my Java app, I can get name , value pairs from url, but a url with "&" as part of a value is causing problem, it looks like this:

http://localhost:6600/Resume_App?Id=Edit&File_Name=AT&T.txt

I know I can replace the string "AT&T" with "ATT" to avoid it, but I don't want to avoid it, there might be other cases, that I can't predict where this char might occur, so I want to solve it, I'm trying to come up with an intelligent way to tell if "&" is part of a value or not. So for values with "&" char, what's a good way to get name value pairs from it ?

Upvotes: 1

Views: 798

Answers (2)

Frank
Frank

Reputation: 31086

After some trial and error, I finally figured it out :

[1] Use this to encode the URL :

  public static String encode(String s)
  {
    try { return URLEncoder.encode(s,"UTF-8"); }
    catch (UnsupportedEncodingException e)
    {
      Resume_App.Save_To_Log("UTF-8 is not a recognized encoding\n"+Tool_Lib_Simple.Get_Stack_Trace(e));
      throw new RuntimeException(e);
    }
  }

[2] Use "exchange.getRequestURI().getRawQuery()" to get the raw query, I was using exchange.getRequestURI().getQuery() eariler, and it decodes the query for me, and made things confusing, what I need is the raw query.

[3] Use the following to get the name value map :

  public LinkedHashMap<String,String> queryToMap(String query)
  {
    LinkedHashMap<String,String> result=new LinkedHashMap();
    for (String param : query.split("&"))
    {
      String pair[]=param.split("=");
      if (pair.length>1) result.put(pair[0],pair[1]);
      else result.put(pair[0],"");
    }
    return result;
  }

[4] Use the following to get decoded name value pairs :

    for (Map.Entry<String,String> entry : params.entrySet())
    {
      paramName=entry.getKey().replace("+"," ");
      try { paramValue=URLDecoder.decode(entry.getValue(),"utf-8"); }
      catch (Exception e) { e.printStackTrace(); }
    }

Upvotes: 1

Mureinik
Mureinik

Reputation: 311308

I think you're going at it the wrong way. Instead of trying to figure out if a certain & is part of a value or an argument delimiter, encode the values before sending them to your app (e.g., by using URLEncoder), and decode it on the other side.

Upvotes: 1

Related Questions