# A Heads up. The poll script can reject a poll for length and won't let you fix it. **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [July 23, 2015, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-heads-up-the-poll-script-can-reject-a-poll-for-length-and-wont-let-you-fix-it/726002 "2015-07-23T21:53:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2015, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-heads-up-the-poll-script-can-reject-a-poll-for-length-and-wont-let-you-fix-it/726002/1 "2015-07-23T21:53:05Z")
Really odd bug. There are maximum topic title lengths. It just stops accepting characters. A simple and elegant programming solution. Turns out there is a poll choice maximum length. It let me enter this long worded option that was intended to lighten the mood of the poll. A little levity. Then I get an error message saying it exceeded the 100 character limit. One that I never heard of. It should have just stopped accepting characters just like thread titles do. Even worse, I couldn’t go back and edit. Ruining a poll thread that I’ve thought about starting for weeks. I copied/pasted my topic and started a new thread. Leaving a mess for the mods. The ruined thread will have to be locked. programmer/analyst for over 25 years. This is a bug in the script and not a feature. I’ve written a lot of code and often times error checking is a nuisance and can bog down coding. I’ll use quick and crude coding to flag the error and clean it up later. I need to stay focused on the code for my main processing. What I’m trying to actually accomplish. update a file record, delete a record etc. If I get pulled into another project then the error checking never gets cleaned up and pretty. It works, but its ugly and clumsy. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2015, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-heads-up-the-poll-script-can-reject-a-poll-for-length-and-wont-let-you-fix-it/726002/2 "2015-07-23T22:04:27Z")
Considering that it requires a mod to the vB base code, and considering how seldom anyone is going to have this happen to them, I don’t see it as something that Ed or Jerry or their corporate overlords are going to be able to do anything about. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2015, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-heads-up-the-poll-script-can-reject-a-poll-for-length-and-wont-let-you-fix-it/726002/3 "2015-07-23T22:07:48Z")
yes, its best to be aware of the poll option limit and don’t risk exceeding it. I certainly won’t. Not ever again. pretty sure the message said 100 characters. so watch out that you don’t get too wordy. The first sentence in this post is over 75 characters. you can easily hit that 100 limit. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2015, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-heads-up-the-poll-script-can-reject-a-poll-for-length-and-wont-let-you-fix-it/726002/4 "2015-07-24T17:14:23Z")
Sometimes being cute can bite you on the ass. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2015, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-heads-up-the-poll-script-can-reject-a-poll-for-length-and-wont-let-you-fix-it/726002/5 "2015-07-24T17:33:07Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > Considering that it requires a mod to the vB base code, and considering how seldom anyone is going to have this happen to them, I don’t see it as something that Ed or Jerry or their corporate overlords are going to be able to do anything about. Which might be why he posted a heads up and not a complaint. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2015, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-heads-up-the-poll-script-can-reject-a-poll-for-length-and-wont-let-you-fix-it/726002/6 "2015-07-24T17:37:43Z")
There’s also a Czarcasm rule about how many choices you can have in a poll. Only came up once that I can recall. ---
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2015, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-heads-up-the-poll-script-can-reject-a-poll-for-length-and-wont-let-you-fix-it/726002/7 "2015-07-28T04:52:27Z")
I’m guessing your last poll choice was something like “They said there’d be pi”… which you then calculated to over 100 decimal places. 🙂 Anyway, thanks for the warning.