# html_decode proc

Source: https://ref.dm-lang.org/proc/html_decode

### Format
> `html_decode(HtmlText)`

### Args
> HtmlText: text to be "unescaped"

### Returns
> unescaped text

Special characters such as \< and \> are not displayed literally in html and may produce garbled output. To display these characters literally, they must be "escaped". For example, \< is produced by the code `<` and > is produced by the code `>`.

The `html_decode()` instruction takes a text string containing such escaped symbols and turns them into their literal counterparts. The more useful function is `html_encode()` which does the reverse.

### See also
> [html_encode proc](https://ref.dm-lang.org/proc/html_encode.md)