Because Instances in Roblox are just userdatas with metamethods that act as a Lua wrapper to interact with the C++ API, I would expect to directly interact with the metamethod functions and expect no issues.
--> I am experimenting around the metamethods of Instances to create a way to combat against DataModel sandboxing. It is a technique used by reverse engineers to try and gain more information about what an obfuscated script is doing by changing/hooking the metamethods of DataModel and logging whenever the metamethods get invoked.
local __index = select(2, xpcall(function()
return game.SomethingThatGetsTheMetamethodToError
end, function()
return debug.info(2, "f") --> returns the __index metamethod of Instances
end))
print(__index(game, "IsLoaded")) --> Successfully indexes into the .IsLoaded function
Using the __index metamethod to index into something like the game.IsLoaded function will work perfectly fine like this __index(game, "IsLoaded") --> function: 0x9aca4a431195d879. If I put a NULL terminator at the end of the string, everything after it will be ignored, as NULL characters are used to declare the end of a C-style string. This example below still works perfectly fine:
__index(game, "IsLoaded\000x") --> function: 0x9aca4a431195d879
However, a weird error arises when I pass a long string, like in the example below:
__index(game, "IsLoaded\000" .. string.rep("random", 150))
--> Throws error `IsLoaded is not a valid member of DataModel "Place1"`
This error can be solved by… Indexing into the .IsLoaded function in camelCase.
__index(game, "isLoaded\000" .. string.rep("random", 150)) --> function: 0x9aca4a431195d879
This issue only arises when attempting to index into a function, property or an RBXScriptSignal. It does not occur when indexing into the children of the Instance.
Expected behavior
What is expected to happen:
Even when passing lengthy strings to the __index metamethod function, I will still be able to index into functions, properties, and signals without having to index into it in camelCase.