URLDecode with Office Script

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Posted on by Niko7

Hello, I want to URL decode the part of the multi-line text HTML in SharePoint if there is an <a href="file:/~</a>.

Since Power Automate does not currently support regular expressions, I was told that using Office Script would be a good option. Could you please tell me how to write it?

I was considering the following, but what do you think?

function main(workbook:ExcelScript.Workbook, targetText:String){
	pattern = new RegExp('<a\\shref=\"file:/.*?</a>','g');
	return targetText.replace(pattern,function(matched) {
        	return urlDecode(matched);
    	});
}

function urlDecode(encodedString:String){
 	 return decodeURIComponent(pattern);
}

I'm currently at home, so I can't use Power Automate.

Thanks a lot in advance!

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Building flows

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ivan_apps 2,189 Moderator on at

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I’m not sure how you would run an office script from inside Power Automate cloud flows, maybe desktop flows if that’s an option for you.

Power Automate expressions do have encodeUriComponent() functions if that’s what you need. It also has a replace() function to substitute the tags you a seeking, with uriEncoded versions of that text. I’m not entirely sure the complexity of your total flow but if you are just replacing <a/> tags you should be fine with the replace() function.

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Nived_Nambiar 18,136 Super User 2026 Season 1 on at

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Hi

As you said, regex operation can be acheived via office script for now in power automate. What i understand is you want to extract the hyperlink present under html format <a href="https://www.g.com">M</a> and decode the url obtained. If yes, you can make the office script to extract the url first and pass it to power automate and using decode function provided by power automate- you can decode the url.

something like below.

First use an office script like below

function main(workbook: ExcelScript.Workbook, targetText: string) { let pattern = new RegExp('(?<=\<a href=").*?(?="\>)'); return targetText.match(pattern) }

Now use run script action in flow which extracts the url from hyperlink provided as input to script. for demo flow i have used a sample input value.

expression used in compose action-

decodeUriComponent(first(outputs('Run_script')?['body/result']))

Hope it helps

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Nived N
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Chriddle 8,672 Super User 2026 Season 1 on at

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Dependent on the HTML, xpath() might be an easier way to get the URLs.

E.g.

xpath( xml(outputs('Compose')), '//a/@href' )

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