Converting html to String - trailing new line

Question

i am working on an application where I am fetching data from the endpoint and then showing them to the user. Most of the "String" data that I am getting is in html format, so I need to convert it into the String. Everything is working, except removing the trailing new line character. These are the extensions that I am using:

Data extension:

extension Data {
    var htmlToAttributedString: NSAttributedString? {
        do {
            return try NSAttributedString(data: self, options: [.documentType: NSAttributedString.DocumentType.html, .characterEncoding: String.Encoding.utf8.rawValue], documentAttributes: nil)
        } catch {
            print("error:", error)
            return  nil
        }
    }
    var htmlToString: String {
        return htmlToAttributedString?.string ?? ""
    }
}

String extension:

extension String {
    var htmlToAttributedString: NSAttributedString? {
         return Data(utf8).htmlToAttributedString
    }
    var htmlToString: String {
        return htmlToAttributedString?.string ?? ""
    }
}

Code sample:

let descriptionHtml = "\n<p>Rømø beach is still a young beach and created from blown sand so fine that it resembles tiny diamonds. All year round, from morning to evening, there will be activity on the beach, known as one of Northern Europe&#8217;s absolute best and widest.</p>\n"
let descriptionAsString = descriptionHtml.htmlToString

//Expected result: "Rømø beach is still a young beach and created from blown sand so fine that it resembles tiny diamonds. All year round, from morning to evening, there will be activity on the beach, known as one of Northern Europe’s absolute best and widest."
//  Actual result: "Rømø beach is still a young beach and created from blown sand so fine that it resembles tiny diamonds. All year round, from morning to evening, there will be activity on the beach, known as one of Northern Europe’s absolute best and widest.\n"
//

I can simply fix this problem by replacing "\n" with "" but i doesn't seem like a gentle solution and since I am using the actual NSAttributedString initializer it surprised my that is not working as I expected it to work. Is there any reason why it leaves the new line character at the end, and is there any way to fix it without manually replacing the new line character?

developer.apple.com/documentation/swift/string/2893517-droplast — Desdenova
– Desdenova, Commented Aug 13, 2020 at 14:15
What if my fetched String data does not end with new line character? This is not a solution. And I already mentioned that if I want to do this manually, i can replace new line characters with empty string, using this method: developer.apple.com/documentation/foundation/nsstring/… — schemabuoi
– schemabuoi, Commented Aug 13, 2020 at 14:19

Rob Napier · Accepted Answer · 2020-08-13 14:19:18Z

1

This text is wrapped in a <p> tag. Typically that would end in a newline if it were rendered. This should be expected behavior. If you don't want this to be "paragraph-like" then it shouldn't be in a <p> tag.

I you remove the <p></p>, but leave the final \n, it will be rendered with a trailing space, which is the normal way of rendering line breaks in HTML. Again, this should be expected behavior. You're rendering HTML. This allows you to render HTML in chunks and glue together the resulting Strings in a sensible way.

answered Aug 13, 2020 at 14:19

Rob Napier

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5 Comments

schemabuoi Over a year ago

I can't remove the tag, since I am fetching the data from the endpoint, the sample code i provided is just a hardcoded presentation of the problem.

Leo Dabus Over a year ago

@schemabuoi so just deal with the resulting string descriptionHtml.htmlToString.filter{!$0.isWhitespace}. if your intent is to remove only the whitespaces at the end of the string descriptionHtml.htmlToString.trimmingCharacters(in: .whitespaces)

Rob Napier Over a year ago

Agreed with Leo. The renderer is doing the right thing. If you don't want that, you should post-process the string.

schemabuoi Over a year ago

@LeoDabus none of your solutions are working. First one removes spaces between words and the second one just doesn't work. But it doesn't matter, if I want the trivial solution I am going to use the method I mentioned in the comment under my question, I was just searching for something "more gentle" then simple string manipulation

Leo Dabus Over a year ago

@schemabuoi sorry posted the wrong property descriptionHtml.htmlToString.filter{!$0.isNewline} or descriptionHtml.htmlToString.trimmingCharacters(in: .newlines)

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