Ability to Set a Character Limit in a Text Field

In certain cases the Name of something that goes into a report can only be so long before it starts to conflict and overlap with something else and make the report unreadable.  In other cases the user is expected to be concise and not write a whole dissertation to name something or. 

I'd like to be able to set a numerical value for the maximum number of characters allowed in a text field where if the user keeps typing it'll flash the text box border or even just stop do anything at all etc.