5 ms·

Except it will forever be called that. A quick example is where I work we have a 'new product x billing' system and it is still called the 'new' one five years

by noahc 12y ago

Except it will forever be called that. A quick example is where I work we have a 'new product x billing' system and it is still called the 'new' one five years later when it is also the only one. There is some debate internally over whether 'new' refers to 'new as in old' or 'new' as in the opposite of 'renewal'. No one knows why it is called what it is called.

couchand 12y ago
This reminds me of so many times doing ad-hoc manual ETL with co-workers, e-mailing back and forth files with names like "accounts-final.csv", "accounts-really-final.csv", "accounts-this-is-the-last-one-for-sure.csv", and inevitably descending into obscenity.
chimeracoder 12y ago
The solution is to use a name that will never get pass legal, like a trademark of another company. That's what Sun did with Swing, which was originally called Kentucky Fried Chicken[0] internally. [0] https://blogs.oracle.com/thejavatutorials/entry/why_is_swing_called_swing https://blogs.oracle.com/thejavatutorials/entry/why_is_swing...
- noahc 12y ago
  In this case, it is an internal project so it never would have touched legal.
peterwwillis 12y ago
That's why you give it a nonsense name. Windows XP was codenamed 'Whistler'. Nobody calls it Whistler (except when reminiscing about the warez scene). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Microsoft_codenames https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Microsoft_codenames https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_name https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_name
- couchand 12y ago
  I came very close to including a "Longhorn" example in my original comment.
forgottenpass 12y ago
Except it will forever be called that. Not as long as you replace it with a new name. Your "new" problem doesn't sound like a problem of stickiness, it's a problem of never giving it an actual name in the first place, or when it was rolled out. Look at the Orbis and Durango for names widely used in when the press was rumor-mongering that went away as soon as the devices were revealed. We've even changed our internal code names on projects without much fanfare, as long as the name change represents a milestone in the project or a difference in audience it's easy to cut over.

by noahc 12y ago

couchand 12y ago

This reminds me of so many times doing ad-hoc manual ETL with co-workers, e-mailing back and forth files with names like "accounts-final.csv", "accounts-really-final.csv", "accounts-this-is-the-last-one-for-sure.csv", and inevitably descending into obscenity.

chimeracoder 12y ago

The solution is to use a name that will never get pass legal, like a trademark of another company. That's what Sun did with Swing, which was originally called Kentucky Fried Chicken[0] internally. [0] https://blogs.oracle.com/thejavatutorials/entry/why_is_swing_called_swing https://blogs.oracle.com/thejavatutorials/entry/why_is_swing...

noahc 12y ago
In this case, it is an internal project so it never would have touched legal.

peterwwillis 12y ago

That's why you give it a nonsense name. Windows XP was codenamed 'Whistler'. Nobody calls it Whistler (except when reminiscing about the warez scene). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Microsoft_codenames https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Microsoft_codenames https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_name https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_name

couchand 12y ago
I came very close to including a "Longhorn" example in my original comment.

forgottenpass 12y ago

Except it will forever be called that. Not as long as you replace it with a new name. Your "new" problem doesn't sound like a problem of stickiness, it's a problem of never giving it an actual name in the first place, or when it was rolled out. Look at the Orbis and Durango for names widely used in when the press was rumor-mongering that went away as soon as the devices were revealed. We've even changed our internal code names on projects without much fanfare, as long as the name change represents a milestone in the project or a difference in audience it's easy to cut over.