Please grant the next Q2A version the ability to allow emojis

[teddydoors]

Please grant the next Q2A version the ability to allow emojis, or in another words 4-byte unicode characters. Currently, there is a big nuisance to achieve it. You can do it by changing the databases settings with uft8mb4 char-set (along with uft8mb4 connection etc...), or doing some tricks to convert emojis into their ALT codes. In either case, you still have to stop Q2A system from removing emojis.

qa_get_post_content function removes emojis from posts.
qa_get_tags_field_value function removes emojis from tags
qa_handle_email_filter removes emojis from handle (ie username)
qa_get_post_title removes emojis from question titles

All 4 functions are done by another function named qa_remove_utf8mb4 in qa-include/util/string.php

Of course, we still want to remove emoji from titles, tags, and usernames. But to stop removing emojis from posts, we need to override qa_get_post_content function. Unfortunately, this function is not overridable. (qa_remove_utf8mb4 in qa-include/util/string.php is not either). We have no choice but to edit the core file.

Back in 2013, there might be some faint reasons that MySQL needs to be at least 5.5. But now, it's 2020, and MySQL version is usually 2 times bigger.

[phy25]

We have no choice but to edit the core file.

I guess then a pull request would be appreciated here.

[arjunsuresh]

There's already a pull request.
#798

[q2apro]

Does it have performance issues? I. e. will q2a be slower with this charset?

If yes, then it should be optional.

[arjunsuresh]

I don't think so. Switching overt to it didn't cause any noticeable issue on our sites.