# Painless support for URI encoding
**URL:** https://discuss.elastic.co/t/painless-support-for-uri-encoding/108901
**Category:** Elasticsearch
**Created:** [November 23, 2017, 1:55pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/painless-support-for-uri-encoding/108901 "2017-11-23T13:55:06Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Ryan\_Grannell](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Ryan_Grannell)
#### Post date: [November 23, 2017, 1:55pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/painless-support-for-uri-encoding/108901/1 "2017-11-23T13:55:07Z")
Hi,
I wasn't sure where to post this, since it's specific to the painless language, but given that I'm using thing from Alerting I figured this was the appropriate category.
I'm trying to URLencode a string, which should be possible with the following code:
```
Base64.getUrlEncoder().encodeToString(myString.getBytes())
```
However, Painless does not seem to include the method `.getBytes()` on `java.lang.String`, which makes the `encodeToString` a bit useless. Is there any way to convert a string to a byte-array (the parameter type of `encodeToString`) in Painless.
Thanks,
Ryan
---
### Author:  [@TimV](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/TimV)
#### Post date: [November 23, 2017, 11:53pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/painless-support-for-uri-encoding/108901/2 "2017-11-23T23:53:11Z")
> [@](#):
>
> I'm trying to URLencode a string, which should be possible with the following code:
>
> ```auto
> Base64.getUrlEncoder().encodeToString(myString.getBytes())
>
> ```
That does not produce a URL encoded string.
`Base64.getUrlEncoder()` returns a URL-safe base64 encoder - that is, it is a Base64 encoder that only uses characters that are "url-safe". Specifically it uses `_` and `-` for the 2 non-alphnumeric characters and doesn't include newlines.
That is not a URL encoder.
Unfortunately, I don't believe painless includes support for URL encoding.
---
### Author:  [@Ryan\_Grannell](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Ryan_Grannell)
#### Post date: [November 27, 2017, 1:52pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/painless-support-for-uri-encoding/108901/3 "2017-11-27T13:52:00Z")
> [@TimV](#):
>
> Base64.getUrlEncoder() returns a URL-safe base64 encoder - that is, it is a Base64 encoder that only uses characters that are "url-safe". Specifically it uses \_ and - for the 2 non-alphnumeric characters and doesn't include newlines.
Hi Tim,
Thanks, I appreciate the clarification.
Regards,
Ryan
---
### Author:  [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)
#### Post date: [December 25, 2017, 1:52pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/painless-support-for-uri-encoding/108901/4 "2017-12-25T13:52:02Z")
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