Desktop variable escaping the URL Encoded Percent Characters .i.e. %2F aka / (Forward Slash)

[Shane_G]

I was working with variables and found that it did not like URL Encoded Percent Characters .i.e. %2F aka / (Forward Slash) when I copied and pasted it, I am assuming this is b/c it is the wrapper for the variable in the Flow Designer, it was easy for me to fix (This time) replaced the characters with ascii values, BUT, was wondering if there is a way to escape the percent sign (and other special characters as needed) as in other languages like C# or JavaScript?

Use case that comes to mind is dynamic content, how do you scan and 'replace' the special characters and escape them???

As always, any and all help would be greatly appreciated, links, references, blogs, etc. are certainly welcome (Especially on this topic) and know I appreciate those who contribute and help guide me.


Stay safe.
Best Regards.
SG.

[fraenK · Accepted solution]

Usage and escaping is described here:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-automate/desktop-flows/variable-manipulation

Occasionally, the percentage sign should be used as a simple character, instead of denoting a calculation. In those cases, it should be escaped using another percentage character (%%).

Replace text: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-automate/desktop-flows/actions-reference/text#replace

[evanchatter]

An escape character enables you to output characters you wouldn't normally be able to, usually because the browser will interpret it differently to what you intended. The following code shows that the simple and easy method to escape HTML special chars in JavaScript.

var escape = document.createElement('textarea');
function escapeHTML(html) {
escape.textContent = html;
return escape.innerHTML;
}