Personal chat filter (opt-in, disabled by default)

[blakeplusplus]

What problem does this solve?

A personal chat filter would allow users who don't wish to see certain slurs, words, or topics communicated within the in-game chat to block those messages from being visible on their client. This would allow users to curate their social experience.

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.

I personally don't really wanna see slurs. Doesn't feel nice. I do enjoy the social aspect and shit-talking, so I don't want to disable chat entirely if I can help it.

Describe the solution you'd like

A personal disabled by default/opt-in chat filter which uses a basic non-exhaustive list of slurs (the iw4x_filters.json file is likely too exhaustive for this use-case). This filter would intercept chat messages before they are shown on the client, and then remove them if they contain the matching word.

To enable this feature, a console command could be used or you could simply uncomment a line in the slurs list file. The latter would probably be easiest.

Possible extensions to this functionality would include something server side for admins to use, word replacement instead of word filtering, in-game options for toggling on/off the feature.

Technical considerations

No response

Compatibility impact

• This change would be backward compatible
• This change might break compatibility with existing servers/mods
• Unsure about compatibility impact

Describe alternatives you've considered

Turning off chat works, but then you kill the social aspect of the chat. I quite enjoy the chat, so this doesn't work well for me.
Servers on iw4x tend to operate without consideration for anyone other than nostalgic bigoted men, so trusting server admins to do the work is not a viable alternative.

Existing workarounds

No response

Supporting materials

No response

Checklist

• I have searched existing issues to ensure this is not a duplicate
• I have limited this request to a single feature
• I have provided clear use cases for this feature
• I have considered the implementation complexity and compatibility impact

[wroyca]

I understand where this request is coming from, and the motivation makes sense. That said, this is something that's already solvable at the server level: server owners can mute players and set their own moderation policies based on the kind of environment they want to foster.

Implementing client-side filtering on our end would be a significant ongoing effort, and in practice it would turn into a never-ending cat-and-mouse game, with players constantly finding new ways to bypass word-based filters (spacing, symbols, creative spelling, etc.).

In other words, this this is not a good fit for the project. Moderation decisions are better handled by server owners, who can tailor rules and enforcement to their communities.

See also https://github.com/RaidMax/IW4M-Admin/wiki/Features#moderation

[Rackover]

On a game like MW2 the usual experience is that you join a game and you play. Because the game either direct connect to peers or to servers maintained by the publisher. Here on IW4x it's a bit different because, as with all FPSs that live thanks to their community, the user has to join a dedicated server to play. A lot of them propose experiences that are similar or identical to what you'd get in an official, IW server, so it's not a big deal. But the end result is still that you have to play at somebody else's place and that all traditional moderation options you'd have on an official server (reporting player e.g.) disappear. each server has to implement their own reporting and then enforce it

You're right Wroy, to say that IW4MAdmin already does all that. Most servers have rules and reports and mods and so on. And as such, server can alerady implement a word blacklist or someting of the like. But I don't know if this is relevant here
I dont know if it's relevant because a lot of users probably click on a server because of the map, ping and playercount, and not because it's X or Y community. These communities can do some filtering and banning but they can't do it 24/7 and even treating reports takes time, & obviousy they have various levels of what they consider tolerable or not that varies per community. If you just join a server to play, you have no idea what words are gonna get filtered or not. And it's not like you should have to know it if you just want to ... play skidrow snd and not be called the n-word, right

So the existence of a serverside word blacklist is good but I dont think it actually relates to the issue that was opened here

Muting a player to remove their messages from the chat is a good idea but muting sombody is still something you have to do while playing - so it doesn't have the same experience improvement as a word blacklist. Putting a word blacklist clientside allows 90% of player to have something that's "good enough" for them (whether the server they play on is moderated or not) and the rest can edit it freely without asking nobody, and implement other languages if they so want

If the message contains a word from the blacklist, the user is auto muted just as if you had clicked on their name in the list, and that's it. Not a specific chat-level feature, more like an automatic mute that triggers whenever sombody in your game wrote the n-word. You'll never know it - you never have to know it.

I don't think anybody is entitled to Wroy implementing that himself or anybody else really, but I think this issue should definitely stay open should somebody want to tackle it. Providing a simple default blacklist for a handful of common slurs that "automatically mutes" whoever says them from your PoV, and then people are free to edit it with notepad on their end or to share blacklist between each other. No server work required, this works hand in hand with whatever IW4M already provides, to streamline the experience of playing IW4x - somewhat similar to what you'd (hope to) get on MW2 IWNet

[wroyca]

See also discord.com/channels/1111981994428076053/1111982470045368361/1465751618527170817 for relevant discussion.

[Rackover]

So TLDR here is the requirement checklist that I would suggest:

• This feature should be enabled by default
• Assuming an implementation where muting somebody on the scoreboard will make all their chat messages hidden
• Whenever a chat messages contains a word from the blacklist, the author is muted immediatly as if the client had muted them by clicking on the scoreboard. The offending chat message is never displayed, because the user is muted.
• There are no feedbacks for the message author or for the message receiver that anything has happened. It works silently, but feel free to put a trace in the console when it happens.
• The word blacklist should be easy to edit/override for the end-user, and by default should contain a handful of slurs universally considered offensive.
• This system should be toggleable by a cl_ clientside Dvar, enabled by default;

In that context I personally would weigh in fully in favour of such a feature.

Up for grabs!

[Rackover]

Opt-in vs Opt-out is a hot topic currently so that can be discussed further when the feature, well, exists in the form of a PR maybe 😼