Replace double backslashes with a single backslash in javascript

Question

I have the following problem:

I have a script that executes an AJAX request to a server, the server returns C:\backup\ in the preview. However, the response is "C:\\backup\\". Not really a big deal, since I just thought to replace the double slashes with single ones. I've been looking around here on stack, but I could only find how to replace single backslashes with double ones, but I need it the other way around.

Can someone help me on this matter?

Answer 1

This should do it: "C:\\backup\\".replace(/\\\\/g, '\\')

In the regular expression, a single \ must be escaped to \\, and in the replacement \ also.

[edit 2021] Maybe it's better to use template literals.

console.log(`original solution ${"C:\\backup\\".replace(/\\\\/g, '\\')}`)

// a template literal will automagically replace \\ with \
console.log(`template string without further ado ${`C:\\backup\\`}`);

// but if they are escaped themselves
console.log(`Double escaped ${`C:\\\\backup\\\\`.replace(/\\\\/g, '\\')}`);

// don't want to replace the second \\
console.log(`not the second ${`C:\\\\backup\\\\`.replace(/\\\\/, '\\')}`);

// don't want to replace the first \\
console.log(`not the first ${`C:\\\\backup\\`.replace(/[\\]$/, '\\')}`);