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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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As noted by The Verge, a strange iMessage bug is causing the final word of certain phrases sent via Messages to an iPhone to be invisible to both the message sender and the recipient.

When the following two phrases are sent using iMessage, the last word is not displayed on the iPhone:

- I could be the next Obama (with a space after Obama)
- The best prize is a surprise

imessagebug.jpg
Both messages look complete when they are being composed, and the full text shows up in notifications, but within the Messages app itself, the words Obama and surprise are both invisible. Copying and pasting the message displays the original text.

Many Twitter users have been able to confirm the problem, which only appears to affect the iPhone.

The bug was first noticed back in December and posted on the Apple Support forums. It appears that additional phrases trigger the truncation as well, though it is unclear what is causing the issue.

Update: As noted on the MacRumors forums, the issue appears to be related to character width. From Arian19:
You can test it out, and even if you change "I could be the next Odama " as the phrase it still gets deleted.

The problem is that the message app, thinks the phrase will fit in a one line bubble, but it actually puts the last word on a hidden second line.

It works with these two phrases because they are the exact width needed, and it is not based on character count, but character width. For example, "l" is skinner than a "w".

Article Link: Odd iMessage Bug Truncates Last Word of Certain Text Phrases
 

Rudy69

macrumors 6502a
Mar 30, 2009
790
2,415
If I had to take a guess I would say it's a small bug that the bubble isn't wide enough and Obama gets wrapped to the next line (and you can't see it)

Source: I'm a developer and I've worked on an app where we had chat bubbles like that and I had a bug where the bubble size wasn't calculated properly and it ended up a bit like that
 

FSMBP

macrumors 68030
Jan 22, 2009
2,711
2,600
Uhh...that didn't work for me and my friend now thinks I'm crazy.

Edit: Got it to work. I needed to put a space after "surprise" even though the directions only specified that only needed to be done with after the "Obama" phrase:

When the following two phrases are sent using iMessage, the last word is not displayed on the iPhone:

- I could be the next Obama (with a space after Obama)
- The best prize is a surprise
 
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DBQGeek

macrumors newbie
Jul 10, 2009
2
0
It's a bug on the NSA servers which reads everything we send. Apparently some flagged words are getting removed from the messages. Big brother strikes again!
 

lolkthxbai

macrumors 65816
May 7, 2011
1,426
489
Didn't work for me neither

EDIT: I forgot to add a space, nvm. It works(broken)
 
Last edited:

Magnum Opus

macrumors regular
Apr 28, 2011
142
0
iMessage. Does there need to be a space after "surprise"? As the directions only specified to have a space after Obama, I didn't include one after "surprise".

Sensationalist story. Count the characters, the issue occurs on any sentence with 26 characters
 

darster

Suspended
Aug 25, 2011
1,703
1
Works fine for me. Sent both via imessage from my mac and iphone 5 to another iPhone 5.
 

bacaramac

macrumors 65816
Dec 29, 2007
1,424
100
For someone who runs software projects, these bugs are almost impossible to find in testing. Takes real world users to find weird things like this.
 

cire

macrumors 6502
Jun 21, 2007
262
0
Ok this explains why some of my text convos between my gf and I have been getting messed up

Like the fact that it comes out as you calling her by another woman's name...who happens to be her sister...and messed up by sending pictures of your 'surprise'?
 

doncornelius

macrumors newbie
Feb 14, 2011
11
0
Spam filtering

This is probably bad spam filtering, maybe from auto-generated spam rules. Don't those phrases look like something you'd get in spam emails??
 

autrefois

macrumors 65816
Sensationalist story. Count the characters, the issue occurs on any sentence with 26 characters

"The best prize is a surprise" (w/o the quotes) is 28 characters. For me I can't reproduce the glitch on my iPhone's iMessage or on my Mac's Messages, whether by typing it or pasting it in. Weird.

I'm using iOS 6.1.3 on an iPhone 4. I wouldn't see why phone model would play into it though, but my iOS is in French though.

If I had to take a guess I would say it's a small bug that the bubble isn't wide enough and Obama gets wrapped to the next line (and you can't see it)

Source: I'm a developer and I've worked on an app where we had chat bubbles like that and I had a bug where the bubble size wasn't calculated properly and it ended up a bit like that

This makes sense, but wouldn't completely explain why it's not working for some of us (or is working, depending on your perspective)
 
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