Maximal chains of nested subspaces I need to answer the following question:

Let $V_n(q)$ be $n$-dimensional vector space over $\mathbb {F}_q$ with
  $\mathbb{F}_q$ fields with $q$ elements. How many different maximal
  chains of nested subspaces of $V_n(q)$ are there?

I know what a maximal chain of an ordered set is but have no idea how to connect it with a vector space. I was desperatedly looking for some explanation but didn't find anything. Any help of you would be very much appreciated!
 A: A maximal chain of subspaces will be of the form $0 \subset F_1 \subset F_2 \subset \ldots \subset F_n = V_n(q)$, where each $F_i$ is $i$-dimensional. Indeed, such a chain is maximal because we can't have any subspace $F$ with $F_i \subsetneq F \subsetneq F_{i+1}$. Conversely, if we have a chain of length $m < n$, say $0 \subset F_1 \subset \ldots \subset F_m \subseteq F_{m+1} := V_n(q)$, then for some $i$, we have $\dim F_{i+1} - \dim F_i > 1$ (or $F_m \subsetneq F_{m+1}$, in which case we can extend the chain by adding $V_n(q)$ at the end). Then we can construct $F_i \subsetneq F \subsetneq F_{i+1}$ by picking some $v \in F_{i+1}\setminus F_i$ and letting $F = \text{span}(F_i,v)$.
Now note that giving a subspace $F_i$ is the same as giving a basis for it, and that if $F_i \subset F_{i+1}$, we can extend a basis of $F_i$ to a basis of $F_{i+1}$. So we have reduced the question to finding ordered bases $\{v_1 < v_2 < \ldots < v_n\}$ of $V_n(q)$ (we then define $F_i := \text{span}(v_1,\ldots,v_i)$). Now we just have to be careful to identify two bases $\{v_i\}$ and $\{w_i\}$ if each $v_i$ is a scalar multiple of $w_i$, because in that case the bases will give rise to the same subspaces.
Now the question is purely combinatorial. Note that we can never pick the zero vector as a $v_i$. Since the $\mathbb F_q$-span of a vector has size $q -1$ (excluding $0$) and $V_n(q)$ has $q^n$ elements, we have $(q^n - 1)/(q-1)$ options for $v_1$.
Now $v_2$ should not be in $F_1 = \text{span}(v_1)$, so there are $q^n - q$ choices. However, from these options, $v_2$ and $v_2'$ give rise to the same subspace $F_2$ whenever $v_2 - v_2' \in F_1$, so really we want an equivalence class of such an element in $V_n(q)/F_1$; i.e. for the counting argument we have to divide by $q$ an additional time. Thus there are $(q^{n}-q)/q(q-1)$ options for $v_2$, $(q^n - q^2)/q^2(q-1)$ options for $v_3$, etc. So we get
$$
\prod_{k=0}^{n-1} \frac{q^{n}-q^k}{q^k(q-1)} = \prod_{k=0}^{n-1}\frac{q^{n-k}-1}{q-1}
$$
total such chains.
