Convert HTML characters to readable string

Scripting Forums AppleScript | Mac OS X
#1

How can I go about converting the following into a readable string? Browsers display this text correctly. And for the sake of learning…what are these strings called?UTF-8,Unicode,hex,html entities?

Thank you very much,

Todd

Hmm…I cannot get the string to post as non-readable. The string is AmpersandNumbersign40semicolon…all are the same except the number:
the numbers are 40,84,111,32,116,104, etc.

#2

Try something like this:

on unescapeHTML(aString)
	return do shell script "echo " & quoted form of aString & " | /usr/bin/ruby -e 'require \"cgi\"; puts CGI.unescapeHTML(STDIN.read)'"
end unescapeHTML

unescapeHTML("I can't put appropriate example text here.")

They are called HTML entities.