Why do computers sometimes change special characters like “&” into “&” or “ ”

Question

Why do computers sometimes change special characters like “&” into “&” or “ ”

In: 77

Answer 1

You will see this for example in URL, where the & character has a special meaning for the computer. In this context, & Is use as a separator between two character string.

But then how do you have & as part of the string? Well you replace it with &amp (amp for ampersand, it is the name of the & character)

Same for &nbsp, which means non breaking space