BUG! Sending copy/pasted text to PVA chatbot in Teams causes unexpected formatting issues

[tim_w]

This bug still exists even though a previous topic has it incorrectly marked 'solved'.

++ I am using Power Virtual Agents (web), published to Teams.

PVA chatbots are designed to receive plain text user input. The expected behavior is for PVA to strip away any 'behind the scenes' formatting and only pass plain text.

Expecting the customer to manually strip hidden formatting by copy/pasting into a notepad is not an acceptable workaround. This is terrible UX and could not be realistically communicated to the average end user.

This is a bug and needs to be addressed by Microsoft.

Example:

I highlight and copy the text 'REQ693205' from a Teams message I sent earlier:

I then paste this text "REQ693205' into teams and send the message to the chatbot:

And even though it appears to have no formatting, the user response is saved as '\r\n\n\r\nREQ693205\n\n'

This also gets passed onto Power Automate and in my case breaks the flow as it is expecting "REQ693205"

This is frustrating for both developers and end-users and is negatively impacting customer satisfaction and adoption.

This is unexpected, undocumented behavior that needs to be acknowledged as a bug so it can be fixed ASAP.

Thank you.

[renatoromao]

Hi @tim_w ,

Thanks for your feedback! 🙂

You can do a workaround replacing \r\n and \n\n values into the workflow (Power Automate).

Follow below some posts that can help you:

- Solved: Replace Newline in Flow Expression - Power Platform Community (microsoft.com)

- Solved: Split at \r\n\r\n - Power Platform Community (microsoft.com)

[tim_w]

Thanks @renatoromao for your response! I appreciate your help but I must emphasize that this is not an acceptable solution. It is not realistic to rely on a Power Automate function to correct each and every message that could possibly be copy/pasted. This would add substantial development overhead... so much that it negates much of the value gained by using PVA in the first place. The only way to guarantee consistent behavior is to correct the underlying bug.

[nick_g]

Hi @tim_w @renatoromao 

Maybe try adding the following step(s) to your Power Automate flow to convert the PVA Input(s) to Plain Text

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/connectors/conversionservice/

Simply put the PVA Input required in this:

Note this is a (preview) feature but seems to do the trick.

Cheers

[tim_w]

Fantastic workaround, thank you! This should hold me over until the bug is fixed.

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Spoiler

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@tim_w wrote:

This bug still exists even though a previous topic has it incorrectly marked 'solved'.

++ I am using Power Virtual Agents (web), published to Teams.

PVA chatbots are designed to receive plain text user input. The expected behavior is for PVA to strip away any 'behind the scenes' formatting and only pass plain text.

Expecting the customer to manually strip hidden formatting by copy/pasting into a notepad is not an acceptable workaround. This is terrible UX and could not be realistically communicated to the average end user.

This is a bug and needs to be addressed by Microsoft.

Example:

I highlight and copy the text 'REQ693205' from a Teams message I sent earlier:

I then paste this text "REQ693205' into teams and send the message to the chatbot:

And even though it appears to have no formatting, the user response is saved as '\r\n\n\r\nREQ693205\n\n'

This also gets passed onto Power Automate and in my case breaks the flow as it is expecting "REQ693205"

This is frustrating for both developers and end-users and is negatively impacting customer satisfaction and adoption.

This is unexpected, undocumented behavior that needs to be acknowledged as a bug so it can be fixed ASAP.

Thank you.

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