Re: On new names for "Deity"
On 27 Feb 1998 bruce@va.debian.org wrote:
> I like a few of the suggestions that have been presented. Alas, only a
> few :-)
>
> I think we should go with "Trove" for the package management portion
> of our administration tool suite, and go on to other issues now. It's
> a unique name, it doesn't sound like anything else, it arouses
> curiousity, and has the advantage of not being an acronym. It
> accurately reflects the feeling we want people to have about the free
> software collection that it accesses.
but the trouble with 'trove' is that
a) it sounds dumb - how am i supposed to keep a straight face when
telling people to run "trove"?
b) it is counter-intuitive - if there is any mnemonic or link
betweeen its name and its function, it is an awfully contrived
one.
> trove
> ('tr{o-}v)
> Etymology: short for i[treasure trove]
> 1) n, DISCOVERY, FIND
> 2) n, a valuable collection: TREASURE HAUL]
the link between a treasure trove and package manager / installation /
configuration tool is tenuous at best. It's non-obvious, and my bet is
that the most common reaction to having it explained will be <groan>how
tacky/contrived/dumb</groan>.
trove might be a good name for a warez site management tool, but it's
terrible as a legit package mgr.
> So far, I haven't heard much suggestion that this is a horrible
> hateful name.
i was kind of hoping that it would just go away... the only suggestion i
heard that was worse than 'trove' was 'dfine'.
> I think we spend way too much time on the names of things. I don't think we
> need to continue to throw ideas into the hat and go on to an election about
> them :-) .
names are important, and trove is a really bad one. if you're going to pick
a non-geeky (i.e. non-acronym, non-computer releated) name then it should be
somthing that sounds good, not something that makes you think of a 5 year
old reading pirate stories.
a dumb name will inspire scorn rather than respect (or even "cool!"),
means that deity is far less likely to spread beyond debian (which i
think is premature planning anyway - lets have something to dominate the
world with before we start planning it!)
- Packrat was cool. i liked that.
- Adam was a good suggestion. A recursive acronym - a nod to GNU and the FSF,
and phonetically similar to 'adm', which is good (but plain) for an admin
tool. remember that geeks and hackers tend to like puns and word games.
- debtool was fine.
- nab for "nuts and bolts" was ok too.
craig
PS: FWIW, i always though "deity" was a dumb name too.....arrogant and
overbearing.
--
craig sanders
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