how to handle %20 while string comparison in c#

Question

I am trying to compare two strings but one of the string contains a white space at the end. I used Trim() and compared but didn't work because that white space is getting converted to %20 and I thing Trim does not remove that. it is something like "abc" and "abc%20" , what can I do in such situation to compare strings whih ignoring the case too?

Answer 1

%20 is the url-encoded version of space.

You can't directly strip it off using Trim(), but you can use HttpUtility.UrlDecode() to decode the %20 back to a space, then trim/do the comparison exactly as you would otherwise;

using System.Web;

//...

var test1 = "HELLO%20";
var test2 = "hello";

Console.WriteLine(HttpUtility.UrlDecode(test1).Trim().
           Equals(HttpUtility.UrlDecode(test2).Trim(),              
           StringComparison.InvariantCultureIgnoreCase));

> true

Answer 2

Use HttpUtility.UrlDecode to decode the strings:

string s1 = "abc ";
string s2 = "abc%20";
if (System.Web.HttpUtility.UrlDecode(s1).Equals(System.Web.HttpUtility.UrlDecode(s2)))
{
    //equals...
}

In case of WinForms or Console (or any non ASP.NET) project you will have to add reference to the System.Web assembly in your project.