# Suggestion: let's fix my earlier terrible suggestion
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334
**Category:** About This Message Board
**Created:** [July 28, 2010, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334 "2010-07-28T17:49:37Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/1 "2010-07-28T17:49:37Z")
Certain subversive elements, hellbent on destroying the board, [suggested disabling the quote-stripping function](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=571708) in vBulletin to allow fully nested quotes. This was obviously a terrible idea, though to be fair anyone with a lick of sense should have known from the poster’s history that his ideas should be treated with deep suspicion, if not outright hostility.
Luckily, I have found a way to undo the damage this warty and unattractive poster has caused: a [vBulletin mod](http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/showthread.php?t=148372) that is trivially easy to install and allows one to set a limit on the nest level. I have installed and tested it and it works beautifully.
Here’s how to do it:
1. Undo the previous change to includes/functions.php (just remove the return $text; line).
2. Download the .zip file in the above link, unpack it to reveal the file product-nested\_quotes.xml. (If you don’t want to register with [vbulletin.org](http://vbulletin.org), just PM or email me and I’ll send you the .zip file.)
3. In the Admin CP, go to Products and Plugins / Manage Products and click on the Add/Import Product link at the bottom. Upload the xml file. That’s it.
4. To set the nesting level, go to vBulletin Options and select Nested Quotes at the bottom. I recommend changing the level from the default (3) to 2.
This will fix not only our quoting problems but will make everyone on the board happier and more fulfilled in their personal lives.
---
### Author:  [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/2 "2010-07-28T17:52:36Z")
Flip flopper.
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### Author:  [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/3 "2010-07-28T18:06:41Z")
> [@Giraffe](#):
>
> This will fix not only our quoting problems but will make everyone on the board happier and more fulfilled in their personal lives.
I look forward to your retraction of this promise next week, when I post evidence against it.
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### Author:  [@Rhythmdvl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhythmdvl)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/4 "2010-07-28T18:39:43Z")
I thought a single code addition was one thing, but installing an add-on was another.
Yeah I’m biased in favour of nested quotes, but there are a shitload of threads with improved posts in them. There is a lot of chaff, too, but I daresay the return of nested quoting is taking some people by surprise.
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### Author:  [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/5 "2010-07-28T18:56:57Z")
> [@Smeghead](#):
>
> > [@Giraffe](#):
> >
> > This will fix not only our quoting problems but will make everyone on the board happier and more fulfilled in their personal lives.
>
> I look forward to your retraction of this promise next week, when I post evidence against it.
Me too.
---
### Author:  [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/6 "2010-07-28T18:58:37Z")
> [@billfish678](#):
>
> > [@Smeghead](#):
> >
> > > [@Giraffe](#):
> > >
> > > This will fix not only our quoting problems but will make everyone on the board happier and more fulfilled in their personal lives.
> >
> > I look forward to your retraction of this promise next week, when I post evidence against it.
>
> Me too.
And the echos…oy veh!
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### Author:  [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/7 "2010-07-28T19:01:06Z")
And next week he will reveal the fix to fix the fix that will fix the fix from last week.
And the week after that…😃
---
### Author:  [@MsWhatsit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsWhatsit)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/8 "2010-07-28T19:07:37Z")
I don’t care what you guys do, as long as it means getting rid of the nested quotes in their current implementation. They are a pain in the ass to edit out, and they are turning threads into giant walls of quoted text.
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### Author:  [@NAF1138](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NAF1138)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/9 "2010-07-28T19:10:34Z")
> [@Giraffe](#):
>
> This will fix not only our quoting problems but will make everyone on the board happier and more fulfilled in their personal lives.
Giraffe, I wonder…Why is it that nested quotes are awesome on your board and suck over here?
The answer that I come up with is that they are actually awesome both places, but it will take longer for people over here to get used to them since this board has a much larger membership. Can we give the new changes a month before we decide we really hate them?
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### Author:  [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/10 "2010-07-28T19:36:19Z")
> [@NAF1138](#):
>
> > [@Giraffe](#):
> >
> > This will fix not only our quoting problems but will make everyone on the board happier and more fulfilled in their personal lives.
>
> Giraffe, I wonder…Why is it that nested quotes are awesome on your board and suck over here?
>
> The answer that I come up with is that they are actually awesome both places, but it will take longer for people over here to get used to them since this board has a much larger membership. Can we give the new changes a month before we decide we really hate them?
Guess what – it’s not **Giraffe** ’s decision to make. Here, at least. There, it is.
---
### Author:  [@MsWhatsit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsWhatsit)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/11 "2010-07-28T19:39:12Z")
I didn’t get that the final question in **NAF1138** ’s post was addressed specifically to **Giraffe**. More of a general request to everyone complaining about the nested quotes. Which, by the way, I don’t need a month to decide that I hate. 🙂
I would have quoted **twick** ’s response in this post but I didn’t feel like going through the hassle of editing out the other two nested quotes in order to do so.
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### Author:  [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/12 "2010-07-28T19:46:31Z")
I kinda liked them.
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### Author:  [@NAF1138](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NAF1138)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/13 "2010-07-28T20:19:28Z")
> [@twickster](#):
>
> Guess what – it’s not **Giraffe** ’s decision to make. Here, at least. There, it is.
Yeah, I know. The question about why they work one place and why they don’t another is the only one that was directed at Giraffe. The other was sort of a general question directed at the cosmos.
ETA:
The whole thing was really fairly rhetorical come to think of it.
---
### Author:  [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/14 "2010-07-28T20:25:12Z")
Ah. Sorry. Guess I misread that.
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### Author:  [@Rhythmdvl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhythmdvl)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/15 "2010-07-28T20:31:34Z")
Do I have to wait until I have something new to say about this issue to start a new thread or should I just go ahead?
(No maliciousness intended at Giraffe; just between a moved thread and a what’s-going-on thread, I think this brings it up to four.)
Does anyone know of a board that’s running a version of Vb before they broke the functionality? I think in the interim they added the auto-posted by and breadcrumb. Nested quotes don’t look quite the same as they used to, and I suspect that it’s a combination of that addition and a change in spacing. Not that it’s going to make a difference other than to satiate my curiosity.
---
### Author:  [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/16 "2010-07-28T22:43:15Z")
> [@Giraffe](#):
>
> Certain subversive elements, hellbent on destroying the board, [suggested disabling the quote-stripping function](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=571708) in vBulletin to allow fully nested quotes. This was obviously a terrible idea, though to be fair anyone with a lick of sense should have known from the poster’s history that his ideas should be treated with deep suspicion, if not outright hostility.
So, the old addage about a [del]leopard[/del] giraffe changing his spots isn’t spot on?
---
### Author:  [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/17 "2010-07-28T23:20:14Z")
> [@runner pat](#):
>
> And next week he will reveal the fix to fix the fix that will fix the fix from last week.
>
> And the week after that…😃
Ah, so he works for Microsoft. . .?
---
### Author:  [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/18 "2010-07-28T23:47:06Z")
> [@Giraffe](#):
>
> Luckily, I have found a way to undo the damage this warty and unattractive poster has caused:
>
> Here’s how to do it:
>
> 1. Undo the previous change to includes/functions.php (just remove the return $text; line).
I agree with this much of your post. 😉
---
### Author:  [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2010, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/19 "2010-07-28T23:51:26Z")
> [@Chefguy](#):
>
> > [@runner pat](#):
> >
> > And next week he will reveal the fix to fix the fix that will fix the fix from last week.
> >
> > And the week after that…😃
>
> Ah, so he works for Microsoft. . .?
Actually, I was thinking of [this story](http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/IngPat.shtml) by Ambrose Bierce
---
### Author:  [@Heffalump\_and\_Roo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Heffalump_and_Roo)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2010, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-lets-fix-my-earlier-terrible-suggestion/548334/20 "2010-07-29T16:56:07Z")
> [@Giraffe](#):
>
> This will fix not only our quoting problems but will make everyone on the board happier and more fulfilled in their personal lives.
Not only does your new proposed solution not fix the problem of having to strip out embedded quote material for most people, it also doesn’t adequately solve the problem you originally claimed was the reason that you wanted nested quoting, except for the one situation you described.
Here’s the issue you claimed was the problem:
> [@Suggestion: restore nested quoting](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggestion-restore-nested-quoting/547536/36):
>
> The reason I like the feature is that since the default was changed to no nested quotes, you end up with people commenting on other people’s arguments without context, e.g.
>
> [QUOTE=poster B]
>
> [QUOTE=poster A]
> This statement is factually incorrect.
Wrong. You’re forgetting that many frogs eat small bees.
[/QUOTE]
What statement is poster A disagreeing with? Now I have to scroll all the way back up, giving myself crippling carpal tunnel syndrome.
[/QUOTE]
At two levels of nesting (which is what you’re testing at Giraffe Boards), you might be able to tell who poster A is disagreeing with, but then anyone who answered poster B would have the same problem.
The more elegant way to solve the problem is to go back to stripped quoting and use the mult-quote function, which is largely made useless by nested quoting.
> [@NAF1138](#):
>
> Giraffe, I wonder…Why is it that nested quotes are awesome on your board and suck over here?
Mostly because it’s not true. Here’s a [complaint thread](http://www.giraffeboards.com/showthread.php?t=14097) with a bunch of negative comments about nested quoting on Giraffe Boards.
There’s not as much of an impact there since many of the posts are not very long.
Also, giving feedback there has been largely ineffective for me, so I gave my feedback here instead of there. Perhaps other people felt similarly.
> [@twickster](#):
>
> Guess what – it’s not **Giraffe** ’s decision to make. Here, at least.
::copying out to my gratitude journal::
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