How to disable escaping when copy and pasting in IntelliJ?

Question

When I copy and paste string text into quotes Intellj always escapes certain characters like ", etc,. How can I disable this annoying feature?

It's annoying indeed but on the other hand, [their Unicode support is buggy](https://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issue/IDEA-72989) so I just live with the ugly entities for now. — mik01aj, Sep 06 '16 at 13:41

ajp15243 · Accepted Answer · 2014-07-28T04:58:02.807

47

You can use Ctrl+Alt+Shift+V (presumably ⌘+Alt / Option+Shift+V for OS X) to do Paste Simple (also available from the right-click context menu). This will paste your most recent clipboard content without escaping it.

Many other programs that offer "simple pasting" will use Ctrl+Shift+V instead, but in IntelliJ that opens an IntelliJ clipboard memory dialog, where you can choose previously copied text to paste.

Note that these are all default, but customizable, keyboard shortcuts.

edited Jul 28 '14 at 04:58

answered Mar 19 '14 at 12:59

ajp15243

7,704
1
32
38

4

awesome, thanks for the info! yeah, four keys to simple copy and paste. I will definitely be re-wiring the shortcuts. =) thx again. – genxgeek Mar 19 '14 at 13:17
1

You are quite welcome :). And I agree, it's one hell of a shortcut! – ajp15243 Mar 19 '14 at 13:28
1

Sadly it also does it when dragging text around :/ – braks Feb 06 '16 at 06:32

score 16 · Answer 2 · answered May 28 '16 at 00:16

16

I found the Ctrl + Shift + Alt + V combination a bit cumbersome, and after some digging I found an alternative solution that was more to my liking. I want to share it here in case it is useful to anyone else.

You can actually edit the key mappings for the paste simple command, and replace them with the standard Ctrl + V that most people are familiar with.

Simply go into File -> Settings -> Keymap and enter "paste" into the search box to bring up all the various paste commands. Double click "Paste Simple" and enter Ctrl + V for the shortcut.

You will be warned that the shortcut is currently assigned and you will be given the option to remove it. After doing so, you have pretty much replaced the annoying "enhanced paste" with the standard "simple paste".

Hope that helps someone out there :)

answered May 28 '16 at 00:16

BMB

1,598
13
10

1

Note that you also need to change the binding of shift-Insert and it doesn't change the behaviour of drag-and-drop copy. – Florian F Oct 23 '17 at 13:35
Thanks for the additional info! I discovered the process in a rather hack-ish way, I wasn't aware :) – BMB Oct 23 '17 at 14:31
1

I had to reverse the setting, because "Paste Simple" doesn't work in other places, like pasting a file in the project panel. – Florian F Oct 27 '17 at 07:27
1

My compromise is to use the "Shift + Insert" keystroke for the "Paste Simple" action for editors. Avoids the cumbersome "Ctrl + Shift + Alt + V" default and doesn't have twist other actions out of shape (like what compelled @FlorianF to revert) – Stevel Jul 02 '18 at 14:27

score 8 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 12 '19 at 17:06

8

as of December 2019, at least in IntelliJ Ultimate 2019.3, there is a configuration option to disable this annoying behavior: Go to Editor --> Smart Keys --> Javascript and uncheck the "Escape text on paste in string literals" checkbox.

answered Dec 12 '19 at 17:06

Clint Eastwood

4,995
3
31
27

4

This seems however only available for json and JavaScript in the options. Couldn't find it for java :( Or did you find this anywhere for java as well? Hope they will add this option. Nice username btw^^ – judos Feb 10 '20 at 14:07
Great solution, thanks. This works in WebStorm as well. – rurp Jul 08 '21 at 00:00

How to disable escaping when copy and pasting in IntelliJ?

3 Answers3