URL Encode a string in jQuery for an AJAX request

I'm implementing Google's Instant Search in my application. I'd like to fire off HTTP requests as the user types in the text input. The only problem I'm having is that when the user gets to a space in between first and last names, the space is not encoded as a +, thus breaking the search. How can I either replace the space with a +, or just safely URL Encode the string?

$("#search").keypress(function(){		
	var query = "{% url accounts.views.instasearch  %}?q=" + $('#tags').val();
    var options = {};
	$("#results").html(ajax_load).load(query);
});

Try encodeURIComponent.

> Encodes a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) component by replacing each instance of certain characters by one, two, three, or four escape sequences representing the UTF-8 encoding of the character (will only be four escape sequences for characters composed of two "surrogate" characters).

Example:

var encoded = encodeURIComponent(str);

encodeURIComponent works fine for me. we can give the url like this in ajax call.The code shown below:

  $.ajax({
    cache: false,
    type: "POST",
    url: "http://atandra.mivamerchantdev.com//mm5/json.mvc?Store_Code=ATA&Function=Module&Module_Code=thub_connector&Module_Function=THUB_Request",
    data: "strChannelName=" + $('#txtupdstorename').val() + "&ServiceUrl=" + encodeURIComponent($('#txtupdserviceurl').val()),
    dataType: "HTML",
    success: function (data) {
    },
    error: function (xhr, ajaxOptions, thrownError) {
    }
  });

Better way:

encodeURIComponent escapes all characters except the following: alphabetic, decimal digits, - _ . ! ~ * ' ( )

To avoid unexpected requests to the server, you should call encodeURIComponent on any user-entered parameters that will be passed as part of a URI. For example, a user could type "Thyme &time=again" for a variable comment. Not using encodeURIComponent on this variable will give comment=Thyme%20&time=again. Note that the ampersand and the equal sign mark a new key and value pair. So instead of having a POST comment key equal to "Thyme &time=again", you have two POST keys, one equal to "Thyme " and another (time) equal to again.

For application/x-www-form-urlencoded (POST), per http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/interac...m-content-type, spaces are to be replaced by '+', so one may wish to follow a encodeURIComponent replacement with an additional replacement of "%20" with "+".

If one wishes to be more stringent in adhering to RFC 3986 (which reserves !, ', (, ), and *), even though these characters have no formalized URI delimiting uses, the following can be safely used:

function fixedEncodeURIComponent (str) {
  return encodeURIComponent(str).replace(/[!'()]/g, escape).replace(/\*/g, "%2A");
}

I'm using MVC3/EntityFramework as back-end, the front-end consumes all of my project controllers via jquery, posting directly (using $.post) doesnt requires the data encription, when you pass params directly other than URL hardcoded. I already tested several chars i even sent an URL(this one http://www.ihackforfun.eu/index.php?title=update-on-url-crazy&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1) as a parameter and had no issue at all even though encodeURIComponent works great when you pass all data in within the URL (hardcoded)

Hardcoded URL i.e.>

 var encodedName = encodeURIComponent(name);
 var url = "ControllerName/ActionName/" + encodedName + "/" + keyword + "/" + description + "/" + linkUrl + "/" + includeMetrics + "/" + typeTask + "/" + project + "/" + userCreated + "/" + userModified + "/" + status + "/" + parent;; // + name + "/" + keyword + "/" + description + "/" + linkUrl + "/" + includeMetrics + "/" + typeTask + "/" + project + "/" + userCreated + "/" + userModified + "/" + status + "/" + parent;
    

Otherwise dont use encodeURIComponent and instead try passing params in within the ajax post method

 var url = "ControllerName/ActionName/";   
 $.post(url,
        { name: nameVal, fkKeyword: keyword, description: descriptionVal, linkUrl: linkUrlVal, includeMetrics: includeMetricsVal, FKTypeTask: typeTask, FKProject: project, FKUserCreated: userCreated, FKUserModified: userModified, FKStatus: status, FKParent: parent },
 function (data) {.......});

try this one

var query = "{% url accounts.views.instasearch  %}?q=" + $('#tags').val().replace(/ /g, '+');

use jQuery.param().....
Description: Create a serialized representation of an array, a plain object, or a jQuery object suitable for use in a URL query string or Ajax request. In case a jQuery object is passed, it should contain input elements with name/value properties.