Rails - Jun 2009 - URI::InvalidURIError with open-uri and Google Maps

Hello,

I''m getting an URI::InvalidURIError in my controller when I use german
characters in the uri. Google accepts them but open-uri not. How to
encode them?

That''s my controller simplified:

def index
  require ''open-uri''
  address = "Bürgerstraße+68+01127+Dresden"
  api_key = "my api key"
  json = open("http://maps.google.com/maps/geo?q=#{(address)}
&output=json&key=#{api_key}").read
  render :text => json
end

My environment:
Rails 2.3.2
Gem 1.3.4
ruby 1.8.6 (2008-08-11 patchlevel 287) [universal-darwin9.0]

Yours, Matthias.

Ok, I should precise my question. I know I have to encode the special
charactes to ascci code. For js, java and php there is a function to
convert the characters. I didn''t found one for rails.

So is there a better way for converting then gsub for every single
special char:?
address = address.gsub(/ü/,''%FC'')

Yours,
Matthias.

> Ok, I should precise my question. I know I have to encode the special
> charactes to ascci code. For js, java and php there is a function to
> convert the characters. I didn''t found one for rails.
>
> So is there a better way for converting then gsub for every single
> special char:?
> address = address.gsub(/ü/,''%FC'')
>
> Yours,
> Matthias.
URI.encode

http://www.ruby-doc.org/core/classes/URI/Escape.html

If it seems like something that should be a standard part of the
language, it probably is: always check the docs first.