Text Field (Usually Name/Subject)

The “Text Field” option in the Maspik plugin allows you to protect text fields in forms from spam. With the various options, you can set different limits and filters to ensure that unwanted information does not reach your forms.

Text Fields blacklist

Description: This option allows you to set a forbidden list of words or phrases that, if they appear in the text field, will mark the message as spam.

How to Use:

1. Open the plugin settings.
2. Open the Text Fields accordion.
3. Add each word or phrase you want to block on separate lines.

Example:

casino
free money
Eric jones
SEO
click here

If you add those words to the list, any message containing any of these words will be marked as spam.

New Behavior in Version 2.4.0:

Starting from version 2.4.0, blacklist filtering now matches exact words only. This means that blocked words must appear as standalone words in the text field. Partial word matches will no longer trigger a block.

For example:

• Blocking casino will block “Win big at the casino!”
• Blocking bet will block “This is a great bet!”
• But Blocking ad will not block “adobe” anymore.

This change helps prevent false positives where short words mistakenly block unintended words.

Risk & Best Practices:

• Exact Match Behavior: Since the blacklist now checks for whole words, you may need to add multiple variations of spam terms. For example, instead of just “crypto”, you might also want to block “cryptocurrency” and “cryptotrade”.
• Regular Review: Periodically review the spam log to ensure no legitimate messages are being blocked.

Additionally, adding too many words to the blacklist might result in false positives where legitimate messages are mistakenly marked as spam. To mitigate this risk, regularly review the spam log to ensure no legitimate messages are being blocked.

Limit Characters

Description: The “Limit Characters” option in the Maspik plugin allows you to set both minimum and maximum character limits for text fields. Messages that do not meet these criteria will be marked as spam.

How to Use:

1. Open the plugin settings.
2. Open the Text Fields accordion, and turn on the Limit characters toggle.
3. Enter the minimum and maximum number of required characters.

Example:

• MinCharactersInTextField: If you set the minimum value to 2, any message with less than 2 characters will be marked as spam.
• MaxCharactersInTextField: If you set the maximum value to 500, any message with more than 500 characters will be marked as spam.

Risk:

• Minimum Characters: Setting the minimum character count too high in text fields used for names may block legitimate short names/messages. To avoid this, set a reasonable minimum character count (e.g., 2) and periodically check the spam log for false positives.
• Maximum Characters: Setting the maximum character count too low may block legitimate long messages. Make sure to review the spam log regularly to ensure that valid messages are not being blocked mistakenly.

Character limit custom validation error message

Description: This option allows you to set a custom error message that will be displayed when the user exceeds the minimum/maximum number of characters.

How to Use:

1. Open the plugin settings.
2. Open the Text Fields accordion, and turn on the “Character limit custom validation error message” toggle.
3. Enter your custom error message.

Example: Enter a message like:

Your message length is invalid. Please ensure it's between 2 and 500 characters long.

to inform the user exactly what the issue is and how to fix it.