How to remove escape char from string in bash using sed? - bash

Question

I need to remove escape character from the string in bash. I get a data structure, which contains url paths with / escaped so I receive the regular link:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/ask
as one with escaped /:
http:\/\/stackoverflow.com\/questions\/ask
Now I need to remove \ from the second link. For this purpose I tried using sed
`echo '"'${paths[$index]}'"' | sed "s#\\##g"`
But I get an error:
sed: -e expression #1, char 6: unterminated `s' command
If I replace \\ with ie. _ it works like a charm and removes all occurrences of _ in a string. How do I get rid of escape characters in a string using sed?

Answer 1

try this:
.......|sed 's#\\##g'
or:
.......|sed "s#\\\\##g"
EDIT add a test output:
kent$ echo "http:\/\/stackoverflow.com\/questions\/ask"|sed "s#\\\\##g"
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/ask
kent$ echo "http:\/\/stackoverflow.com\/questions\/ask"|sed 's#\\##g'
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/ask

Answer 2

Your question isn't clear about which way round you want so here is both ways:
$ sed 's#/#\\/#g' <<< "http://stackoverflow.com/questions/ask"
http:\/\/stackoverflow.com\/questions\/ask
$ sed 's#\\/#/#g' <<< "http:\/\/stackoverflow.com\/questions\/ask"
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/ask

Answer 3

You don't need to use sed.
paths[index]=${paths[index]//\\/}
or simply
echo ${paths[index]//\\/}
to see the result without modifying the value in-place.

Answer 4

You can use this :
sed 's#\\##g'
But the problem is when you encounter a backslash that you actually want in the string, but is escaped. In that case :
sed 's/\\\\/\x1/' |sed 's/[\]//g' | sed 's/\x1/\\/g'
Replaces the double backslash with with a temp character[SOH], replaces all other backslashes and then restores the backslash that is needed.