usernames in other languages

[Steve Freides]

I moderate our forum and would like to know how other moderators/admins handle people creating usernames, thread titles, and posting in languages you don't speak. We already have a rule that people must post in English - our company is based in the US and the only language all the moderators speak is English. We have forum members from all over the world.

I recently had someone sign up with a username that's in a foreign language - I would like to prevent that from happening in the future, again for the simple reason that, without translating it, I can't tell if it's profanity or something else that we normally wouldn't allow.

Thanks in advance for your replies.

-S-

 

[Mr Lucky]

We just enforce the posting in English rule. As usernames can be any random combination of letters and numbers I can’t think how you could enforce a specific language.

 

[Steve Freides]

How can I prevent, e.g., someone from registering as a user with a username that's in a foreign language? I just had that happen? I noticed only because they contacted me about something else.

Thanks.

-S-

 

[Arantor]

You kind of can’t, though. Even in the US you will have people whose real legal names aren’t Americanised, have accents and so on. And parts of the US do legitimately have Spanish as a common language.

Basically unless their mere existence is a problem (in which case you probably want to vent every single account that registers), it is only an issue if they post in something other than English, which is a moderation issue either way - and one you’ll potentially have even with an English sounding username.

 

[StarArmy]

If you're worried about a username, you can always run it through a free translator like deepl or Google translate to check it.

I don't worry about that much on my forum. If people want to make a username composed entirely of food emojis that's okay with me as long as they're an active member bringing in life to the community.

 

[Steve Freides]

If you're worried about a username, you can always run it through a free translator like deepl or Google translate to check it.

That's what I did. My issue is that this didn't run through my approval queue because of the username - I would like usernames that aren't in the Latin alphabet to show up for approval - that would be one solution for me.

I don't worry about that much on my forum. If people want to make a username composed entirely of food emojis that's okay with me as long as they're an active member bringing in life to the community.

Again, my issue isn't with the username itself, just that I don't want to have to go find all these and manually translate them - that's what I have an approval queue for. I would simply like them not to be allowed because then I wouldn't have to deal with them at all, but being able to flag them would be an improvement.

-S-

 

[Mr Lucky]

You kind of can’t, though. Even in the US you will have people whose real legal names aren’t Americanised, have accents and so on.

I agree it would be so difficult to disallow non-English usernames. e.g. we have a user called bimblas72 and many other similar. Even Freides might be turned down by a filter for English words!

 

[Steve Freides]

I agree it would be so difficult to disallow non-English usernames. e.g. we have a user called bimblas72 and many other similar. Even Freides might be turned down by a filter for English words!

It's not English words that concern me, it's a non-Latin alphabet. "bimblas72" is something I can at least read.

-S-

 

[Paul B]

Add this to the username registration regex: /^[a-z0-9]+$/i .

That will allow a to z and numbers.

Add any additional characters as needed after the 9, for example: /^[a-z0-9 -_]+$/i .

 

[Steve Freides]

Add this to the username registration regex: /^[a-z0-9]+$/i .

That will allow a to z and numbers.

Add any additional characters as needed after the 9, for example: /^[a-z0-9 -_]+$/i .

This would be: forum_name/community/admin.php?options/groups/usersAndRegistration/ then where it says

Username Registration

then

Username Match Regular Expression

is that right? If so, mine is now blank and you're suggesting I can enter the string you've suggested?

Just want to confirm before I do this.

Thanks very much.

 

[Paul B]

Yes, enter the text there.

 

[Steve Freides]

Yes, enter the text there.

Thanks. Will try that now. Appreciate the help.

-S-