Want to form a string with given hex code values

Question

I want to replace certain characters in an input string with other characters.

The input text has Microsoft left and right smart quotes which I would like to convert to just a single ".

I was planning on using the Replace operation, but am having trouble forming the text string to be searched for.

I would like to replace the input sequence (in hex) \xE2809C, and change that sequence to just a single ". Ditto with \xE2809D.

How do I form the string to use in the Replace operation?

I'm thinking of something like (in a loop):

tempTxt = tempTxt.Replace(charsToRemove[i], charsToSubstitute[i]);

but I'm having trouble creating the charsToRemove array.

Maybe a bigger question is whether the whole input file can be read and converted to plain ASCII using some read/write and string conversions in C#.

Thanks, Mike

Answer 1

Something like this?

char [] charsToRemove = {
    '\u201C', // These are the Unicode code points (not the UTF representation)
    '\u201D'
};

char [] charsToSubstitute = {
    '"',
    '"'
};

Answer 2

You may want to give Regex a shot. Here's an example that will replace smart-quoted text with the single ".

string tempTxt = "I am going to “test” this.  “Hope” it works";
string formattedText = Regex.Replace(tempTxt, "s/“|”|“|”/", @"""");

Answer 3

I'm using a ReqPro40.dll to read data. The data is stored as text. Hope I didn't lose too much on copy/paste below. The stuff below works to the best of my knowledge. But I want to get rid of longer sequences of bad characters. E2809C should become a quote, but I'm having trouble matching it.

string tempTxt = Req.get_Tag(ReqPro40.enumTagFormat.eTagFormat_ReqNameOrReqText);
tempTxt=tempTxt.Substring(1, tempTxt.Length-1);

char[] charsToRemoveForXMLLegality = new char[]
{ '\x000a', '\x000b', '\x0002', '\x001e', // NL, VT, STX, RS
  '\x0034', '\x8220', '\x8221',           // ", left double, right double quote
  '\x8216', '\x8217',                     // left single quote, right single quote
  'x8211', '\x8212',                     // en-dash, em-dash
  '\x0188', '\x0177',                     // 1/4 fraction, plus/minus
  '\x8230', '\x0160'                      // ellipsis, non-breaking space
};   
string[] charsToSubstituteForXMLLegality = new string[]
        { " ", " ", "", "-",
          "\"", "\"", "\"",
          "\'", "\'",
          "-", "-",
          "1/4", "+/-",
          "...", " "
       };

for (int i = 0; i < charsToRemoveForXMLLegality.Length; i++)
{
    tempTxt = tempTxt.Replace(charsToRemoveForXMLLegality[i].ToString(), charsToSubstituteForXMLLegality[i]);
}