Stk-code: Players can spam the chat with very long messages, making lobby and gameplay unusable

[Wuzzy2]

Description

Players can spam/flood the chat with very long messages. This has the following effects:

• In lobby, chat becomes unreadable. Others are basically deprived of their speech
• In game, the chat overlay becomes very large and covers half of the screen. The game becomes very difficult, it's like having a plunger in your face, but for the entire race.

Steps to reproduce

• Play online
• Write very long messages
• Congratulations! You are now a master troll and hated by everyone

Workaround

Immediately kick players that abuse the chat.

Configuration

STK release version: 1.0.0

Possible fixes

1. Limit effective chat message length, both on server and client side.
2. Limit the size of the chat overlay in the GUI. Make sure it only covers a small part of the screen and that GUI does not break down, no matter the input. Maximum size be two lines. Cut off any text beyond that.
3. ???

[linuxgorl]

Yes, the layout is completly broken when it mess up with this:
testtesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttesttest

[bluecat999]

The chat feature could have a frequency limit as well as a character limit. It might also be worth (if not done already) limiting characters on the server-side so newlines can't be spammed, etc..

[sgreene570]

Would it be possible to word wrap text without spaces, say if you were sending a url or other string in chat?

[CodingJellyfish]

See https://github.com/supertuxkart/stk-code/issues/3781

[linuxgorl]

Or allow scrolling to previous messages

[Wuzzy2]

This issue is !!!NOT!!! just about word wrapping! Word wrapping is just a part of it.
It is also about that players can send very loooong messages that cover the entire screen. Just try repeating the same word over and over again.

[ghost]

I think there could be a system that detects if the text is touching the edge of the chat. Then, if so, open a new line.

[bluecat999]

I think there could be a system that detects if the text is touching the edge of the chat. Then, if so, open a new line.

As Wuzzy2 said, that is not the issue. Word wrapping (the name for what you suggested) has already been discussed.

The issue is that I can send messages to you while you are driving and they will show up on your screen. If I make long messages that cover multiple lines, it will cover the screen and block your view of the road.

[laikokseong]

[CodingJellyfish]

Benau recently added something to avoid long message in game. Have a try!
Also i think we should add a max chatting frequency per player in serverconf

[Alayan-stk-2]

This should be much less of an issue now.

The height of the in-race chat is limited to 3 lines (5 earlier on, and unlimited at the time this issue was opened), and one can chose to keep the lobby chat on but the in-race chat off.

Keeping open because some frequency-limiting on message sending would be useful.