HttpServerUtility.UrlPathEncode vs HttpServerUtility.UrlEncode

Question

What\'s the difference between HttpServerUtility.UrlPathEncode and HttpServerUtility.UrlEncode? And when should I choose one over the other?

Answer 1

Update: as of 4.5, per MSDN reference, Microsoft recommends to only use UrlEncode. Also, the information previously listed in MSDN does not fully describe behavior of the two methods - see comments.

The difference is all in the space escaping - UrlEncode escapes them into + sign, UrlPathEncode escapes into %20. + and %20 are only equivalent if they are part of QueryString portion per W3C. So you can't escape whole URL using + sign, only querystring portion. Bottom line is that UrlPathEncode is always better imho

You can encode a URL using with the UrlEncode() method or the UrlPathEncode() method. However, the methods return different results. The UrlEncode() method converts each space character to a plus character (+). The UrlPathEncode() method converts each space character into the string "%20", which represents a space in hexadecimal notation. Use the UrlPathEncode() method when you encode the path portion of a URL in order to guarantee a consistent decoded URL, regardless of which platform or browser performs the decoding.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/4fkewx0t.aspx