Question involving Name Filtering

[inHeadspace (vee)]

Hey, I was wondering about something involving the text filter. If a player inputs a name for their character, but only that specific player will see the name in NPC dialogue, would we have to filter the name?

For example, if I input my Name as Jeta, NPCs would refer to me as Jeta, but only I would see that.

[prepsure (paige)]

I believe you only have to filter text that can be seen by other players

[rbx_lua (Matthew)]

You still have to filter the text, even the currently playing user is the only one who will ever see it. There are several reasons for this that have been thrown around, namely cases like compromised accounts being exposed to inappropriate content, as paranoid as that sounds. I’ve seen some mention that this is also because we can’t trust kids not to input personal information into these datastores that could eventually be seen by the game developer or other users.

[inHeadspace (vee)]

Ah, alright.

[Corecii]

@RBX_Lua

I’ve seen some mention that this is also because we can’t trust kids not to input personal information into these datastores that could eventually be seen by the game developer or other users.

You are allowed to store unfiltered text in data stores. That is not a concern. You just need to filter before displaying.

@ContextLost

You are allowed to store unfiltered text in DataStores, and filter it when you load it, before you display it. This is how we recommend dealing with text in DataStores now, since the text filter changes all the time.

@UristMcSparks

A very small note on this, I do not recommend filtering before storing. We make updates to the filtering function from time to time, so it is best to store the original string and only filter right before displaying. That way the string is always filtered using the latest rules.

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@RBX_Lua

You still have to filter the text, even the currently playing user is the only one who will ever see it.

To clear things up, you only need to do this if you save it. I would further presume that you only need to filter if you load it from the data store – you don’t need to filter text for the same player that typed it in the same session. When you “jump” over to a new session or “jump” to new users, you need to start filtering.

@ContextLost

You don’t need to filter the string if it is only displayed to the user who entered it and it is not stored between sessions. If it is saved or persists in any way after the player leaves you will need to filter it.

@JParty

Note: You will most likely not see your own input text filtered locally. This can be very confusing, so I want to mention this system explicitly. However, ANY text input by a user that can be accessed in any other session or is ever viewed by another user will need to be filtered.

Still might be best to self-filter if you’ll have to filter in future sessions to reduce confusion, but I want to make sure that the filtering rules are as clear as possible. It can be hard to find clear information about it from staff so I keep relevant bookmarks for cases like this.

[inHeadspace (vee)]

Ohh, okay, that makes more sense

[madattak]

@Corecii

You are allowed to store unfiltered text in data stores. That is not a concern. You just need to filter before displaying.

I was under the impression that any user text that gets saved to datastores has to be filtered, for the reasons outlined by RBX_Lua.

[Corecii]

I can’t tell if you’re still under that impression or not. It sounds like you’re arguing that text should be filtered before storing.

I once thought it had to be filtered before storing, too. The two staff replies I quoted say otherwise. Here are links to them if you want to see the full replies:

• Post 1 by ContextLost
• Post 2 by UristMcSparks

It’s important to note that it does have to be filtered before displaying, even if it’s to the same user it came from. I mentioned this in my previous reply as well.