Java URL encoding of query string parameters

Question

Say I have a URL

http://example.com/query?q=

and I have a query entered by the user such as:

random word £500 bank

Answer 1

URL url= new URL("http://example.com/query?q=random word £500 bank $");
URI uri = new URI(url.getProtocol(), url.getUserInfo(), IDN.toASCII(url.getHost()), url.getPort(), url.getPath(), url.getQuery(), url.getRef());
String correctEncodedURL=uri.toASCIIString(); 
System.out.println(correctEncodedURL);

Prints

http://example.com/query?q=random%20word%20%C2%A3500%20bank%20$

What is happening here?

1. Split URL into structural parts. Use java.net.URL for it.

2. Encode each structural part properly!

3. Use IDN.toASCII(putDomainNameHere) to Punycode encode the host name!

4. Use java.net.URI.toASCIIString() to percent-encode, NFC encoded unicode - (better would be NFKC!). For more info see: How to encode properly this URL

In some cases it is advisable to check if the url is already encoded. Also replace '+' encoded spaces with '%20' encoded spaces.

Here are some examples that will also work properly

{
      "in" : "http://نامه‌ای.com/",
     "out" : "http://xn--mgba3gch31f.com/"
},{
     "in" : "http://www.example.com/‥/foo",
     "out" : "http://www.example.com/%E2%80%A5/foo"
},{
     "in" : "http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/first book.pdf", 
     "out" : "http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/first%20book.pdf"
}, {
     "in" : "http://example.com/query?q=random word £500 bank $", 
     "out" : "http://example.com/query?q=random%20word%20%C2%A3500%20bank%20$"
}

The solution passes around 100 of the testcases provided by Web Plattform Tests.