Don't edit Vanilla files! You will end up with problems that no one will be able to help you with.
If you only want to read the code, look at
/library/core/functions.general.php getMentions()
/library/core/class.format.php mentions()
I wrote a plugin to change the mention behavior, but the way mentions are formatted in Vanilla 2.2 has changed so that some of the functionalities of this plugin are obsolete. You could use it as a blueprint for your problem, though.
Comments
In what file: @NIK replaced -> a href="Nik"
Don't edit Vanilla files! You will end up with problems that no one will be able to help you with.
If you only want to read the code, look at
/library/core/functions.general.php getMentions()
/library/core/class.format.php mentions()
I wrote a plugin to change the mention behavior, but the way mentions are formatted in Vanilla 2.2 has changed so that some of the functionalities of this plugin are obsolete. You could use it as a blueprint for your problem, though.