[SOLVED] vim cannot replace double quotes

walterbyrd · 09-11-2020, 05:51 PM

Code:

<p>This privacy policy (“policy”) will help you understand how thissite.com (“us”, “we”, “our”) uses and protects the data you provide to us when you visit and use thissite.com (“website”, “service”).</p>

HTML needs the " replaced with " so I have tried:

Code:

:%s/\"/&quot;/g

and

Code:

:%s/"/&quot;/g

But I keep getting the error:

Code:

E486: Pattern not found: \"

or

Code:

E486: Pattern not found "

Why can it not find the pattern?

berndbausch · 09-11-2020, 06:25 PM

Leave out the backslash, and add it before the &:

Code:

s/"/\&quot;/g

The ampersand has a special meaning (the text that matches the search pattern) and must be escaped.

boughtonp · 09-12-2020, 09:24 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by walterbyrd

HTML needs the " replaced with "

No it does not!

If a tag's attribute starts with a double quote, then double quotes within the attribute's value need to be escaped (so they are not misinterpreted as the end of the value), but that is the only situation it needs doing.

(Of course, there is a difference between ASCII double quote (") and the angled quotes in your string - you may or not want “ and ” instead.)

walterbyrd · 09-15-2020, 06:47 AM

Code:

:s/"/\&quot;/g

Did not work either. Not with string that I used in my original post. I got the same answer.

> (Of course, there is a difference between ASCII double quote (") and the angled quotes in your string - you may or not want “ and ” instead.)

THAT was the issue. It did not occur to me that those were not ASCII double quotes.

Went back and copy pasted those angel quotes, and it worked.

Code:

:s/”/\&quot;/g 
:s/“/\&quot;/g