passing unicode strings from django to javascript

Question

I have a bunch of unicode strings in my data which I need to pass from my django view to template for using in a JavaScript scriptlet that passes it to the web back and forth.

The problem is I want the strings to be represented in the JavaScript unicode form but I get strings with a u prefix from python.

For example, for the string mężczyźni, Python stores it as u'm\u0119\u017cczy\u017ani' but when it is passed to the template, it does not remove the u prefix which creates problems for JavaScript while processing it. I want it to be simply 'm\u0119\u017cczy\u017ani' so that the JavaScript code in the template can use it.

I tried using urqluote, smart_unicode, force_unicode but couldn't hit a solution or even a hack.

What do I do ?

Answer 1

Edit: Django 1.7+ no longer includes simplejson. Instead of

from django.utils import simplejson

write

import json

and then use json instead of simplejson.

---

You are probably printing the python repr of your data dict, and trying to parse it in javascript:

{{ your_python_data }}

Instead, you could export your data in json:

from django.utils import simplejson

json_data_string = simplejson.dumps(your_data)

And load the data directly in javascript:

var your_data = {{ json_data_string }};

You could also make a template filter:

from django.utils import simplejson
from django import template
from django.utils.safestring import mark_safe

register = template.Library()


@register.filter
def as_json(data):
    return mark_safe(simplejson.dumps(data))

And in your template:

{% load your_template_tags %}

{{ your_python_data|as_json }}

Note that you should be careful with XSS, if some of "data" comes from user input, then you should sanitize it.