Managing Bad Words

Introduction

AutoKB allows you to specify words and phrases that you would like to prevent from appearing in your articles and comments. The Bad Words feature of the software allows you to do just that. You can either replace bad words with a string of your choice, or reject articles and comments that contain bad words. This document explains the bad words interface in detail.

Adding A Bad Word

To add a bad word, click on the Manage Bad Words link in the control panel interface. If there are no bad words defined, you will be taken directly to the page where you can add a bad word. However, if you already have some bad words defined you will be taken to the bad word management interface. From there you can press the Add a Bad Word button to access the bad word creation page.

Once you are on the bad word creation page you will see a form that you will need to fill in. Each of the form fields is described below.

Word - This is the word or phrase that you do not want to appear in your knowledge base
Matching - This is the type of matching you would like to use. Further information is below
Action - This defines what should happen when this word/phrase is found. If you choose reject the article or comment will not be allowed in the database. If you choose replace, the word/phrase will be replaced with the string you enter in the Replacement field
Replacement - If you set the Action to replace, this is the string that the word/phrase will be replaced with. You can leave this blank if you are using the reject Action.

Once you have filled in each of the form fields with appropriate values, press the Add Bad Word button. AutoKB will add the new bad word to the database and that word/phrase will no longer be allowed. Note that when you add a bad word it is not added retroactively, it will only affect new articles and comments. You will be able to manage all of the bad words you create through the category management interface, which is explained in detail in this document.

Types of Matching

For bad words there are two types of matching: strict and loose. Depending on the word/phrase that you want to add as a bad word you may need to select one of these over the other. Each option is described below.

Loose
With loose matching, AutoKB will search for the word/phrase you enter anywhere in the article or comment. Even if it is only a portion of a word it will match. For example, if you enter the as a bad word and set the matching to loose this will match all of the following: the, their, there, them, etc.

Strict
With strict matching, AutoKB will search for the exact word/phrase in the article comment. It will not match words which contain the word/phrase as part of them. For example, if you enter the as a bad word and set the matching to strict it will match only the and not their, there, or them.

In most cases loose is recommended, however if the word you are adding is commonly found as a substring of other words you may want to consider using the strict option.

Viewing Your Bad Words

To see all of the bad words that currently exist in the database, click on the Manage Bad Words link in the control panel interface. The page that comes up will show you all of the bad words you have created. From this interface you can edit, delete, and view information about each bad word. Each of the columns is described below.

Word - This is the word/phrase you want to disallow
Matching - This is the type of matching that is done for this word
Result if Found - This is the action that will be performed if this word is found
Actions - These are actions that can be performed on the bad word.
Click on the icon to delete the bad word.
Click on the icon to edit the bad word.

Editing a Bad Word

To edit one of the bad words, click on it's icon. AutoKB will load a page where you can edit the word, the matching type, the action performed if the word is found, and it's replacement. Once you have made the changes that you want, press the Update Bad Word button to save the changes. You will be returned to the bad word management interface where the changes will be visible.

Deleting a Bad Word

To delete one of the bad words, click on it's icon. A javascript confirmation window will pop-up asking you if you are sure that you want to delete the bad word. Press the ok button to confirm that you want to delete the bad word. AutoKB will remove the bad word from the database. Newly created articles and comments will now be able to have that word/phrase in them.

Deleting All Bad Words

If for some reason you want to start over with your bad words, you can delete them all at once. To delete all bad words simply press the Delete All Bad Words button near the top of the page. A javascript confirmation window will pop up asking you if you are sure that you want to delete all of the bad words in the database. Press the ok button to confirm that you want to delete all bad words.