Use Python stdlib html.escape() to in django.utils.html.escape()

[Jon Dufresne]

The function django.utils.html.escape() partially duplicates the Python stdlib function html.escape(). We can replace this duplication with wider community developed version.

html.escape() has been available since Python 3.2:

​https://docs.python.org/3/library/html.html#html.escape

This function is also faster than Django's. As Python bug ​https://bugs.python.org/issue18020 concludes, using .replace() can be faster than .translate(). This function gets called numerous times when rendering templates. After making the change locally, I saw the following improvement:

master:

$ python -m timeit -s 'from django.utils.html import escape' 'escape(copyright)'
50000 loops, best of 5: 4.03 usec per loop

branch:

$ python -m timeit -s 'from django.utils.html import escape' 'escape(copyright)'
100000 loops, best of 5: 2.45 usec per loop

One small concern, html.escape() converts ' to &#x27 rather than &#39. These values are functionally equivalent HTML, but I'll mention it as a backwards incompatible change as the literal text has changed

[Jon Dufresne]

​https://github.com/django/django/pull/11276

[Claude Paroz]

Partially related, wouldn't we take advantage of this and change most usages of the single quote inside strings by the typographic quote (’, also “…”) where appropriate?

[Jon Dufresne]

Partially related, wouldn't we take advantage of this and change most usages of the single quote inside strings by the typographic quote (’, also “…”) where appropriate?

I like this idea but feel it is a different objective so I've followed through with in ticket #30400

[Carlton Gibson]

Super. Thanks all!

[Carlton Gibson <carlton.gibson@…>]

In 8d76443a:

Fixed #30399 -- Changed django.utils.html.escape()/urlize() to use html.escape()/unescape().

[Claude Paroz]

One small concern, html.escape() converts ' to &#x27 rather than &#39.

It's annoying, as assertHTMLEqual seems to make a difference between those two equivalent representations, and that means different code paths in apps testing with different Django versions. That's something we should try to solve in django.test.html.

[Jon Dufresne]

It's annoying, as assertHTMLEqual seems to make a difference between those two equivalent representations, and that means different code paths in apps testing with different Django versions. That's something we should try to solve in django.test.html.

Good idea. I added a ​PR for this.

[Carlton Gibson <carlton.gibson@…>]

In 48235ba8:

Refs #30399 -- Made assertHTMLEqual normalize character and entity references.