StringNormalizer.java

import java.text.Normalizer;

public class StringNormalizer {

	public String normalize(String word) {
		
		if (word == null || word.trim().isEmpty())
			return word;

		word = word.replaceAll("[ÂÀÁÄÃ]", "A");
		word = word.replaceAll("[âãàáä]", "a");
		word = word.replaceAll("[ÊÈÉË]", "E");
		word = word.replaceAll("[êèéë]", "e");
		word = word.replaceAll("ÎÍÌÏ", "I");
		word = word.replaceAll("îíìï", "i");
		word = word.replaceAll("[ÔÕÒÓÖ]", "O");
		word = word.replaceAll("[ôõòóö]", "o");
		word = word.replaceAll("[ÛÙÚÜ]", "U");
		word = word.replaceAll("[ûúùü]", "u");
		word = word.replaceAll("Ç", "C");
		word = word.replaceAll("ç", "c");
		word = word.replaceAll("[ýÿ]", "y");
		word = word.replaceAll("Ý", "Y");
		word = word.replaceAll("ñ", "n");
		word = word.replaceAll("Ñ", "N");
		word = word.replaceAll("['<>\\|/]", "");
		
		return word;

	}
	
	public static String removeAccents(String str) {

	    str = Normalizer.normalize(str, Normalizer.Form.NFD);

	    str = str.replaceAll("[^\\p{ASCII}]", "");

	    return str;

	}
	
}