4 ms·

Sort of an unfortunate name collision with Apache Poi, which is one of the largest projects at the Apache Software Foundation.

nurettin 6y ago
Apache Poi and Poi does look similar, but what do you mean by one of the largest? Isn't Apache Poi just an excel reader/writer library?
- ternaryoperator 6y ago
  It's much more than that: It's the principal Java library for accessing and creating Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and other Microsoft format documents. And to the point here, it contains an equation solver, so there are possible points of proximity. But my overarching point is that for some large segment of programmers if you say you're working on a project called POI, they're going to think Apache POI.
littlestymaar 6y ago
It may be large somehow, but I had never heard of it before you mentioned it. I suspect the author is in the same situation.
throwlaplace 6y ago
this is the most pointless comment genre on hn. who really has a problem disambiguating when searching with other keywords? it's not like search engine are hashtables. have you ever been unable to find the right thing after adding at most two keywords? even more likely that google knows if you're searching for apache poi you're not interested in theorem proving so they point you to the right entity immediately.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- mhh__ 6y ago
  It can be fairly annoying. People love to name projects after things in physics (particles mainly) which can make googling slightly annoying although luckily 99% of the results I'm looking for are on stackexchange or arxiv.
- ternaryoperator 6y ago
  >this is the most pointless comment genre on hn...who really has a problem disambiguating when searching with other keywords? Why the snarky reply? Notifying a project of possible conflicts that would reduce its visibility is hardly pointless. And in this specific case, if you spend a moment looking at Apache POI, you'll see that it contains an equation solver, so yes indeed when looking for one you could need to disambiguate the results.
numpad0 6y ago
Where are those names coming from-ish?
- mkl 6y ago
  Well I expect it's not the Māori performance art [1], but that's the first thing New Zealanders will think of. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poi_(performance_art) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poi_(performance_art)

nurettin 6y ago

Apache Poi and Poi does look similar, but what do you mean by one of the largest? Isn't Apache Poi just an excel reader/writer library?

ternaryoperator 6y ago
It's much more than that: It's the principal Java library for accessing and creating Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and other Microsoft format documents. And to the point here, it contains an equation solver, so there are possible points of proximity. But my overarching point is that for some large segment of programmers if you say you're working on a project called POI, they're going to think Apache POI.

littlestymaar 6y ago

It may be large somehow, but I had never heard of it before you mentioned it. I suspect the author is in the same situation.

throwlaplace 6y ago

this is the most pointless comment genre on hn. who really has a problem disambiguating when searching with other keywords? it's not like search engine are hashtables. have you ever been unable to find the right thing after adding at most two keywords? even more likely that google knows if you're searching for apache poi you're not interested in theorem proving so they point you to the right entity immediately.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
mhh__ 6y ago
It can be fairly annoying. People love to name projects after things in physics (particles mainly) which can make googling slightly annoying although luckily 99% of the results I'm looking for are on stackexchange or arxiv.
ternaryoperator 6y ago
>this is the most pointless comment genre on hn...who really has a problem disambiguating when searching with other keywords? Why the snarky reply? Notifying a project of possible conflicts that would reduce its visibility is hardly pointless. And in this specific case, if you spend a moment looking at Apache POI, you'll see that it contains an equation solver, so yes indeed when looking for one you could need to disambiguate the results.

numpad0 6y ago

Where are those names coming from-ish?

mkl 6y ago
Well I expect it's not the Māori performance art [1], but that's the first thing New Zealanders will think of. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poi_(performance_art) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poi_(performance_art)