4 ms·
Slightly off topic, but I feel that when naming one's technical creation it's best to avoid using the last names of famous people especially when that person h
by scarcely 8y ago
Slightly off topic, but I feel that when naming one's technical creation it's best to avoid using the last names of famous people especially when that person has become so famous it's become standard to refer to him/her simply by last name. Just google "Kafka" and check out the first page of search results and you'll see what I mean. (No, googling "Franz Kafka" isn't the same)
- will_pseudonym 8y agoI agree completely. Similarly, I have no idea why the creators of GIMP and CockroachDB (Spencer Kimball and Peter Mattis, and Ben Darnell for the latter) thought those names were the best possible options.
- slededit 8y agoCockroachDB at least refers to their marketing line of "almost impossible to kill/take down" and the way it scales to many servers. There are few less gross insects they could have used though like Bees or Ants.
- andrewflnr 8y agoBees and ants don't have anywhere near the same rep for invincibility. Only one of those animals is a stereotypical nuclear apocalypse survivor.
- slededit 8y agoThey should have went with Water Bears. It can survive even in space. Plus they sound cute (but look scary).
- timrichard 8y agoBee DB is catchy, but would probably violate some sort of Buck Rogers IP
- erikpt 8y agoGIMP is an acronym (backronym?) for the GNU Image Manipulation Program. So I guess to blame GNU if you’re not a fan of GIMP’s name.
- EdwardDiego 8y agoI actually thought that CockroachDB had some relation to Apache Kafka from the name (like Apache Samza does). But nope!
- EdwardDiego 8y agoAre you objecting that Franz Kakfka is buried by Apache Kafka, or vice versa? Either which way, when I google "Kafka" Franz Kafka is the third result, hardly buried.
- scarcely 8y agoResults about Apache Kafka are of interest only to a subgroup of software engineers. Results about Franz Kafka are of interest to a much larger group of people (Frankly, there is simply no comparison). It's the considerate thing to do. And it's not simply a matter of the ordinary person having to type an extra word. There exist tons of valuable web resources (literary analysis, criticism, journal articles) out there about the novelist that does not contain "Franz" anywhere. Finally, it's not like there's an absolute need for any piece of software to be given any particular name.
- AvocadoPanic 8y agoEveryone knows you are supposed to use a stupid spelling for your stupid app / company / product anyway. kaPHka