# Why does the SDMB save so much old stuff?! **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [April 9, 2003, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609 "2003-04-09T18:27:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Lizard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@Lizard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lizard)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2003, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/1 "2003-04-09T18:27:57Z")
I mean, we have threads that no one has posted to in _years_. Why keep them around? Why maintain profiles of people who haven’t posted in years, either? I’ve had enough problems with this Board running slow because of it’s inadequate server. Wouldn’t deleting all threads more than, say, 6 months old and all profiles that have gone unused in at least one year help? ---
**Author:** ![zev\_steinhardt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/97f17d/32.png) [@zev\_steinhardt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zev_steinhardt)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2003, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/2 "2003-04-09T18:40:38Z")
I believe we covered this before. If you search the archives, you’ll find the answer. That’s why… 🙂 Zev Steinhardt ---
**Author:** ![Lizard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@Lizard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lizard)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2003, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/3 "2003-04-09T19:05:52Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by zev\_steinhardt \* > \*\*I believe we covered this before. If you search the archives, you’ll find the answer. > > That’s why… 🙂 > > \*\* Okay, I understand that. But is it really necessary to go back so far? I mean, does anyone even _remember_ threads from, say, 1999? Or even 2001? Who is going to pull thiose up and refer to them now? If we made the cutoff a year or even six months, I’ll bet it would take care of 99.9% of all the thread searches people do. ---
**Author:** ![Achernar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e274bd/32.png) [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2003, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/4 "2003-04-09T19:24:22Z")
Threads don’t take up all that much. I mean, you could probably fit the entire archives onto a couple of CDs, I’ll bet. And obsolete profiles could probably go on a few floppies. I don’t think that memory is the issue. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2003, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/5 "2003-04-09T19:25:11Z")
Yesterday I seached for a post of mine that it turned out was from two years ago. It was for MPSIMS, so it wasn’t really important, but it was nice to have. ---
**Author:** ![Achernar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e274bd/32.png) [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2003, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/6 "2003-04-09T19:47:28Z")
Ah, well in that case, yesterday **I** searched for a post of **mine** that was **three** years old and from **General Questions**. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2003, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/7 "2003-04-09T20:29:31Z")
Hah! When **I** was young, we had to search for ten year old posts, and we didn’t have search engines, either, we had to use candles and read through old file folders. ---
**Author:** ![zev\_steinhardt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/97f17d/32.png) [@zev\_steinhardt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zev_steinhardt)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2003, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/8 "2003-04-09T20:35:42Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Lizard \* > \*\*Okay, I understand that. But is it really necessary to go back so far? I mean, does anyone even _remember_ threads from, say, 1999? Or even 2001? Who is going to pull thiose up and refer to them now? If we made the cutoff a year or even six months, I’ll bet it would take care of 99.9% of all the thread searches people do. \*\* Some threads are popular due to topics that happened at the time. For example, if I wanted to re-hash the whole Bush/Gore election debate on this board, I’d need to pull up the threads from 2000. True, there are some later, post-SCOTUS decision threads on this topic (including one this past week), but hindsight makes people think differently. It’s very entertaining to go back and see what people were thinking at the time (as opposed to now, when we’ve had over two years to reflect on it). Likewise, threads that deal with the September 11 attacks. I know, for example, I’d hate to lose **Cartooniverse** ’s excellent thread [Everything Changed](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=87248) Cartooniverse is an EMT who was at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001 What if, five years from now, I want to go back and read the threads that dealt with the fall of Bahgdad? I’d need the threads from today to do that. In addition, it helps to be able to research positions that a Doper may have taken in the past. I know that I recently debated \*_Jodi_ in a thread and referenced to her a thread from a debate that we had nearly two years earlier. Having that available to me was a help. Just to drive the point home (and to illustrate that I have no life), I routinely go over old threads from debates that I participated in from time to time. As for why “inactive” accounts aren’t deleted, why should they be? Not posting is not grounds for having your posting privliges revoked. I know that I’ve taken leaves of absences from these boards for a month or two at a time (not that anyone noticed ☹ ), but I was happy to have the ability to rejoin the board when I was ready. Zev Steinhardt ---
**Author:** ![zev\_steinhardt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/97f17d/32.png) [@zev\_steinhardt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zev_steinhardt)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2003, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/9 "2003-04-09T20:37:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by C K Dexter Haven \* > \*\*Hah! When **I** was young, we had to search for ten year old posts, and we didn’t have search engines, either, we had to use candles and read through old file folders. \*\* That’s nothing. When I was little, we didn’t even have posts, or candles, or file folders. We had to memorize entire threads by heart. And we were happy too… 😃 Zev Steinhardt ---
**Author:** ![Geek\_Mecha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ecae2f/32.png) [@Geek\_Mecha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geek_Mecha)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2003, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/10 "2003-04-09T23:14:09Z")
Oh yeah? When I was young, we didn’t even have memory. We had to be content with the knowledge we posted funny, intelligent, and informative posts. ---
**Author:** ![This\_just\_in\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b4bc9f/32.png) [@This\_just\_in\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/This_just_in_1)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2003, 5:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/11 "2003-04-10T05:11:35Z")
Would there be some way to isolate the old threads so they didn’t effect performance now? Put them in separate read-only forums, for example? ---
**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2003, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/12 "2003-04-10T05:30:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by This just in … \* > \*\*Would there be some way to isolate the old threads so they didn’t effect performance now? Put them in separate read-only forums, for example? \*\* I did a hack for [tForum](http://www.tforumhacks.com) like that, which would allow the administrator to archive messages before any arbitrary number of days old. It didn’t do much for database size (ok, it actually made it slightly bigger, because of the duplicate table structures), but it really enhanced performance on larger boards. ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2003, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/13 "2003-04-10T12:47:44Z")
Currently vB does not allow for archiving per se. And we’re not willing to hack the system much; it takes too much work to maintain and reinstall when needed. While we do have quite a bit of old stuff, I have been told it does not overly affect board performance. What is causing the slowdowns you may have been experiencing is just plain ol’ other people, hundreds and hundreds of people trying to do the very same thing you’re doing, reading the board, writing to the board, making searches. Those are all far more intensive than holding any material would ever be. Just speaking personally, I’d love to see everything six months old and beyond in “read-only” mode. And some day, that might even happen. But not right now. your humble TubaDiva Administrator ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2003, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/14 "2003-04-10T13:15:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by AudreyK \* > \*\*Oh yeah? When I was young, we didn’t even have memory. We had to be content with the knowledge we posted funny, intelligent, and informative posts. \*\* You were lucky, when I were a lad, we had to deliver our messages on foot, nineteen miles it were, uphill both ways. ---
**Author:** ![vanilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/f19dbf/32.png) [@vanilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vanilla)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2003, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/15 "2003-04-10T13:57:25Z")
in the snow! ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2003, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/16 "2003-04-10T14:35:33Z")
Aye, except it weren’t just the snow we had to endure, it were also the terrible heat. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2003, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/17 "2003-04-10T15:37:09Z")
Another reason for keeping old user accounts… Suppose there was a poster named, say, **WallyM7** , who was prolific and funny and well-liked. And suppose then that **WallyM7** died. Now after 6 months or a year or whatever the time limit is, his profile is cleared. Suddenly the name **WallyM7** is free, and some other unknowing newbie registers and **WallyM7** and starts posting. Can you imagine the grief, headaches, and general confusion and bickering this would cause? The same applies to the dozens (hundreds?) of names of banned trolls, some of them infamous. Also, the way the board works, the poster names are checked against the database. You can see, for example, old threads before the swap to vB that have that field blank. This is from posters who did not reregister, and their names now are missing from the posts, or they are listed as _guests_. So to prevent name recycling, and to keep the posts running smooth, and to keep up with the banned, the old profiles remain. ---
**Author:** ![Geek\_Mecha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ecae2f/32.png) [@Geek\_Mecha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geek_Mecha)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2003, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/18 "2003-04-10T22:25:18Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Mangetout \* > \*\*You were lucky, when I were a lad, we had to deliver our messages on foot, nineteen miles it were, uphill both ways. \*\* You had feet?! Dayum! ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2003, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/19 "2003-04-11T01:30:48Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by TubaDiva \* > **Just speaking personally, I’d love to see everything six months old and beyond in “read-only” mode. And some day, that might even happen. But not right now.** If you ever get to that point, it’s easy to do. A single SQL command and **jdavis** can do it. ---
**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2003, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609/20 "2003-04-11T01:37:53Z")
You wouldn’t need an SQL command at all. Just PHP code to check the last post date against the current date and disallow replying if the difference is more than 6 months. It would just be a copy-and-paste with slight modification of the code fragment that disallows replying to a closed topic. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-the-sdmb-save-so-much-old-stuff/167609.md?page=2)