title: How to update or remove all special characters from a varchar column
body: <p>I've messed around and allow users to create company names to where they're creating company names like so: Tom &amp; Marks Ice Cream Shop.</p>
  
  <p>The problem is that the company name has a link for others to click on the see the company's profile and  .net is throwing a error stating that dangerous characters are not allowed.</p>
  
  <p>I'm not worried about being to precise with the company name the user can update it their self when every they notice that the '&amp;' is gone.</p>
  
  <p>How can I update a column in SQL with SQL syntax to where all the special characters are removed and a space is added in the place of the special character?</p>
  
  <p>Is there a way to identify in sql if there is a special character in a column value?</p>
  
  <pre><code>UPDATE [BuildingPros].[utbProfessionals]
     SET [ProfessionalName] = Replace([ProfessionalName],'some character',' ')
   WHERE ProfessionalName =ProfessionalName
  </code></pre>