[PAID] [$1000] Emoji-only Anchor Text with Hyperlink is accepted/doesn't look right

[kavimuru]

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Action Performed:

1. Open a chat and put an emoji inside of square brackets "[]" and put a link inside of parenthesis "()" and post the comment

Expected Result:

Emoji only should not be accepted as an anchor text or it should look right

Actual Result:

Emoji only is accepted as an anchor text and it doesn't look pleasing to the eye

Workaround:

Can the user still use Expensify without this being fixed? Have you informed them of the workaround?

Platforms:

Which of our officially supported platforms is this issue occurring on?

• Android / native
• Android / Chrome
• iOS / native
• iOS / Safari
• MacOS / Chrome / Safari
• MacOS / Desktop

Version Number: 1.3.9.16
Reproducible in staging?: y
Reproducible in production?: y
If this was caught during regression testing, add the test name, ID and link from TestRail:
Email or phone of affected tester (no customers):
Logs: https://stackoverflow.com/c/expensify/questions/4856
Notes/Photos/Videos: Any additional supporting documentation

2023-05-03.13.37.01.mp4

Expensify/Expensify Issue URL:
Issue reported by: @Nathan-Mulugeta
Slack conversation: https://expensify.slack.com/archives/C049HHMV9SM/p1683110677125259

View all open jobs on GitHub

Upwork Automation - Do Not Edit

• Upwork Job URL: https://www.upwork.com/jobs/~016f4e82bec390b3ae
• Upwork Job ID: 1656089549211725824
• Last Price Increase: 2023-05-10

[MelvinBot]

Triggered auto assignment to @strepanier03 (Bug), see https://stackoverflow.com/c/expensify/questions/14418 for more details.

[MelvinBot]

Bug0 Triage Checklist (Main S/O)

• This "bug" occurs on a supported platform (ensure Platforms in OP are ✅)
• This bug is not a duplicate report (check E/App issues and #expensify-bugs)
  • If it is, comment with a link to the original report, close the issue and add any novel details to the original issue instead
• This bug is reproducible using the reproduction steps in the OP. S/O
  • If the reproduction steps are clear and you're unable to reproduce the bug, check with the reporter and QA first, then close the issue.
  • If the reproduction steps aren't clear and you determine the correct steps, please update the OP.
• This issue is filled out as thoroughly and clearly as possible
  • Pay special attention to the title, results, platforms where the bug occurs, and if the bug happens on staging/production.
• I have reviewed and subscribed to the linked Slack conversation to ensure Slack/Github stay in sync

[strepanier03]

Raised internally for discussion on path forward.

[strepanier03]

Bumped again as we're still unclear what the expected and preferred behavior will be.

[strepanier03]

After a few different discussions, we have come to a consensus that we don't want emoji to be allowed as anchor text for hyperlinks.

[melvin-bot]

Job added to Upwork: https://www.upwork.com/jobs/~016f4e82bec390b3ae

[melvin-bot]

Current assignee @strepanier03 is eligible for the External assigner, not assigning anyone new.

[melvin-bot]

Triggered auto assignment to Contributor-plus team member for initial proposal review - @sobitneupane (External)

[melvin-bot]

Triggered auto assignment to @marcochavezf (External), see https://stackoverflow.com/c/expensify/questions/7972 for more details.

[nazmulpcc]

Proposal

Please re-state the problem that we are trying to solve in this issue.

Emoji only hyperlink doesn't look good.

What is the root cause of that problem?

The link doesn't look good because of the added underline below the emojis.

What changes do you think we should make in order to solve the problem?

As mentioned here we do no want emojis as anchor text in hyperlinks. We can mark the field as "invalid" when some/all anchor text is an emoji and let the user edit the anchortext. We can achieve this by following how ExceededCommentLength is used in ReportActionCompose

What alternative solutions did you explore? (Optional)

We can also

• Remove the underline from links. Like github does:

  • Text only
  • Mixed 🤒 Text 🤒
  • 🤒🤒🤒🤒🤒

• Remove all emojies from anchortexts automatically. This can be achieved by removing all emojis when the text is parsed. This looks like a good place to process the anchor text with a regex and remove all emojis. In this case we also need to decide what the replacement anchortext should be.

[melvin-bot]

📣 @nazmulpcc! 📣
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[melvin-bot]

✅ Contributor details stored successfully. Thank you for contributing to Expensify!

[sobitneupane]

@nazmulpcc Thanks for your proposal.

Can you please be more descriptive in your proposal.

"What is the root cause of that problem?" section should include why is this issue occurring? Where in the codebase the problem lies? Please make use of permalinks.

"What changes do you think we should make in order to solve the problem?" section::

We can achieve this by following how ExceededCommentLength is used in ReportActionCompose

Can you please explain how and for what purpose ExceededCommentLength is used in ReportActionCompose? What changes will be required in code base to solve this particular issue? Where will we make those changes?

[dukenv0307]

Proposal

Please re-state the problem that we are trying to solve in this issue.

Emoji only is accepted as an anchor text and it doesn't look pleasing to the eye.

As mentioned in #18386 (comment), we don't want emoji-only text to be anchor text for links.

What is the root cause of that problem?

We're not validating if the anchor text contains only emojis in the 'link' rule here https://github.com/Expensify/expensify-common/blob/b29d8528cd9be19a131ef77f9edfeb652d2af646/lib/ExpensiMark.js#L107.

What changes do you think we should make in order to solve the problem?

If we don't want the anchor text to contain any emoji
We need to check if the anchor text g1 here contains any emoji:

if (g1.match(EMOJI_REGEX)) {
    return match;
}

(the EMOJI_REGEX can be taken from App here

App/src/CONST.js

Line 1005 in 32662bf

EMOJIS: /[\p{Extended_Pictographic}\u200d\u{1f1e6}-\u{1f1ff}\u{1f3fb}-\u{1f3ff}\u{e0020}-\u{e007f}\u20E3\uFE0F]|[#*0-9]\uFE0F?\u20E3/gu,

)

If we don't want the anchor text to contain only emojis

We need to check if the anchor text g1 here contains only emojis, we can make use of the existing logic in the containsOnlyEmojis method here

App/src/libs/EmojiUtils.js

Line 62 in 1b1e562

function containsOnlyEmojis(message) {

, if yes then we return match;.

After either of the change above (depending on what we want), it will show the user input as is without converting to <a> tag.

(We shouldn't make the composer look like it's invalid/show error message, we simply shouldn't match it as links)

IMO we should only does not allow anchor text to "contains only emojis", if it contains both text and emojis then it should be allowed since the underlined text in that case does not look that bad. Whatever the decision is the above will work fine.

What alternative solutions did you explore? (Optional)

NA

[sobitneupane]

I'm assuming here that we only does not allow anchor text to "contains only emojis", if it contains both text and emojis then it should be allowed since the underlined text in that case does not look that bad.

@strepanier03 Can you please confirm wether we will allow anchor text to contain text with emojis or not?

[strepanier03]

@sobitneupane - We do not want to allow emoji to be used as anchor text for hyperlinks moving forward.

[sobitneupane]

Thanks @strepanier03. So, We will not be allowing emoji at all in the anchor text. Even text mixed with emoji like Mixed 🤒 Text 🤒 will not be allowed.

@dukenv0307 Would you like to update your proposal?

[dukenv0307]

@sobitneupane sure thing!

Proposal updated

[sobitneupane]

Thanks for the update @dukenv0307

Proposal from @dukenv0307 looks good to me.

cc: @marcochavezf

Result will look something like this

[dukenv0307]

@sobitneupane the PR is ready for review

[melvin-bot]

🎯 ⚡️ Woah @sobitneupane / @dukenv0307, great job pushing this forwards! ⚡️

The pull request got merged within 2 working days of assignment, so this job is eligible for a 50% #urgency bonus 🎉

• when @dukenv0307 got assigned: 2023-05-16 00:33:10 Z
• when the PR got merged: 2023-05-16 17:13:47 UTC

On to the next one 🚀

[melvin-bot]

Reviewing label has been removed, please complete the "BugZero Checklist".

[melvin-bot]

The solution for this issue has been 🚀 deployed to production 🚀 in version 1.3.15-12 and is now subject to a 7-day regression period 📆. Here is the list of pull requests that resolve this issue:

• fix: update version expensify common repo #18994

If no regressions arise, payment will be issued on 2023-05-25. 🎊

After the hold period is over and BZ checklist items are completed, please complete any of the applicable payments for this issue, and check them off once done.

• External issue reporter - @Nathan-Mulugeta - $250
• Contributor that fixed the issue - @dukenv0307 - $1000 + $500 (speed bonus) = $1500
• Contributor+ that helped on the issue and/or PR - @sobitneupane - $1000 + $500 (speed bonus) = $1500

Speed bonus assessment: here = Eligible

As a reminder, here are the bonuses/penalties that should be applied for any External issue:

• Merged PR within 3 business days of assignment - 50% bonus
• Merged PR more than 9 business days after assignment - 50% penalty

[melvin-bot]

BugZero Checklist: The PR fixing this issue has been merged! The following checklist (instructions) will need to be completed before the issue can be closed:

• [@sobitneupane] The PR that introduced the bug has been identified. Link to the PR:
• [@sobitneupane] The offending PR has been commented on, pointing out the bug it caused and why, so the author and reviewers can learn from the mistake. Link to comment:
• [@sobitneupane] A discussion in #expensify-bugs has been started about whether any other steps should be taken (e.g. updating the PR review checklist) in order to catch this type of bug sooner. Link to discussion:
• [@sobitneupane] Determine if we should create a regression test for this bug.
• [@sobitneupane] If we decide to create a regression test for the bug, please propose the regression test steps to ensure the same bug will not reach production again.
• [@strepanier03] Link the GH issue for creating/updating the regression test once above steps have been agreed upon: https://github.com/Expensify/Expensify/issues/287309

[strepanier03]

Prepping for the pay hold being removed

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• @sobitneupane - I've hired you to the UpWork job. Finish off the checklist whenever you can and I can update or make the reg test GH if applicable.

• @dukenv0307 - I am having trouble locating your profile in Upwork, can you please apply for the job using this link and also let me know your first/last name in Upwork so I'm confident I'm hiring the right person?

• @Nathan-Mulugeta - I've created a bug reporting job in Upwork and hired you as well.

---

Chat again on the 25th!

[dukenv0307]

@strepanier03 I've applied! My profile is https://www.upwork.com/freelancers/~01f5cbe690701118a2, thanks!

[strepanier03]

Thank you so much @dukenv0307, I really appreciate it. I've hired you as well so we'll be ready for tomorrow.

[strepanier03]

@Nathan-Mulugeta and @dukenv0307 - I've paid you both via Upwork and ended the contracts, thank you!

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@sobitneupane - I'll keep an eye out for the checklist responses and update them when I see you send them through. Then I'll finish pay out and close this GH.

[Nathan-Mulugeta]

Thanks @strepanier03 I just received.

[sobitneupane]

BugZero Checklist: The PR fixing this issue has been merged! The following checklist (instructions) will need to be completed before the issue can be closed:

It's an improvement in the app. I don't think we can blame the PR allowing the emoji in url for causing this issue because it was lately decided to not allow emoji in the url.

[sobitneupane]

Regression Test Proposal

• Send a url having emoji as anchor-text ( i.e, Put an emoji inside of square brackets '[]' and put a link inside of parenthesis '()')
• Verify that emoji is not considered as valid anchor-text.

Do we agree 👍 or 👎

[strepanier03]

Sounds good to me @sobitneupane - I can make that reg test GH.

[strepanier03]

Finished up everything here, paid out the remaining contract and closed it.

Thank you everyone!