Twitter Api how to convert unicode to string? - ios

Question

Twitter Api Response:
"retweet_count" = 0;
retweeted = 0;
source = "Twitter for Android";
text = "ALTIN alm\U0131\U015f ba\U015f\U0131n\U0131 gidiyor... bakal\U0131m t\U00fcrk liras\U0131 daha ne kadar de\U011fersizle\U015fecek #Turkiye #BorsaAltin\U2026 https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1216306036602277889";
truncated = 1;
My code:
let request = client.urlRequest(withMethod: "GET", urlString: statusesShowEndpoint, parameters: params, error: &clientError)
client.sendTwitterRequest(request) { (response, data, connectionError) -> Void in
if connectionError != nil {
print("Error: \(connectionError)")
}
do {
let json = try JSONSerialization.jsonObject(with: data!, options: [])
print("json: \(json)")
} catch let jsonError as NSError {
print("json error: \(jsonError.localizedDescription)")
}
}
}
how can I convert Unicode to string ? i have been don't use model.

Answer 1

I hope this will help.
I made a playground to test this issue. Swift will complain that the String contains incorrect escape characters.
This is a problem and the code will not compile:
Swift expect the Unicode to be formatted with ex '\u0131' or '\u{0131} but you receive the twitter API with '\U0131'
You need to "sanitise" the input first otherwise it will not work! Also when I tested the below I could not save the input in a string with the incorrect escaping. The compiler checks that the strings are correct before doing any operations on them.
I used a trick. Before saving the input from the file I split into an array of characters with map, of these characters I check with filter which one is an escaping backlash remove it and join the characters again to form a string.
Sorry but I did not find any other way, just having '\U' in my input would get Swift yelling at me.
What remains in the input string is "ALTIN almU0131U015f ..etc"
Now I need to replace those 'U0131' with '\u0131' and for this I use Regex:
And this is the final output of my String test as property of my struct after the conversion.
I apologise if my code is a bit messy but it was not easy to get past the string validation in Swift!
The below is the playground code in detail.
What I did is to create a json file with your input as a test:
Then create a struct reflecting the JSON properties, in this case only one: "test"
public struct Test: Codable {
var test = ""
}
// this is the initialisation of the empty struct to be filled from json
var unicodetest: Test = Test()
func parse(json: Data) {
let decoder = JSONDecoder()
if let testmodel = try? decoder.decode(Test.self, from: json) {
unicodetest = testmodel
print(unicodetest.test)
}
}
// Here I get my Json and parse with the above function
do {
guard let fileUrl = Bundle.main.url(forResource: "test", withExtension: "json") else { fatalError() }
let input = try String(contentsOf: fileUrl, encoding: String.Encoding.utf8).map {String($0)}.filter {$0 != "\\"}.joined(separator: "")
if let sanitisedData = input.replacingOccurrences(of: "U(.*?)", with: "\\\\u$1", options: .regularExpression).data(using: .utf8){
parse(json: sanitisedData)
}
} catch {
// if something did not work out
print(error)
}

Answer 2

You can use \u{Unicode}:
print("Ain\u{2019}t i am a smart boy")
/* Prints "Ain’t i am a smart boy"
You can Use this Extension as well
extension String {
var unescapingUnicodeCharacters: String {
let mutableString = NSMutableString(string: self)
CFStringTransform(mutableString, nil, "Any-Hex/Java" as NSString, true)
return mutableString as String
}
}
let input = "ALTIN alm\\u0131\\u015f ba\\u015f\\u0131n\\u0131 gidiyor... bakal\\u0131m t\\u00fcrk liras\\u0131 daha ne kadar de\\u011fersizle\\u015fecek #Turkiye #BorsaAltin\\u2026 https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1216306036602277889"
print("result: \(input.unescapingUnicodeCharacters)")
//ALTIN almış başını gidiyor... bakalım türk lirası daha ne kadar değersizleşecek #Turkiye #BorsaAltin… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1216306036602277889