def strip_control_characters(input):
if input:
import re
# unicode invalid characters
RE_XML_ILLEGAL = u'([\u0000-\u0008\u000b-\u000c\u000e-\u001f\ufffe-\uffff])' + \
u'|' + \
u'([%s-%s][^%s-%s])|([^%s-%s][%s-%s])|([%s-%s]$)|(^[%s-%s])' % \
(unichr(0xd800),unichr(0xdbff),unichr(0xdc00),unichr(0xdfff),
unichr(0xd800),unichr(0xdbff),unichr(0xdc00),unichr(0xdfff),
unichr(0xd800),unichr(0xdbff),unichr(0xdc00),unichr(0xdfff),
)
input = re.sub(RE_XML_ILLEGAL, "", input)
# ascii control characters
input = re.sub(r"[\x01-\x1F\x7F]", "", input)