How do you choose a good app name?

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idle
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Re: How do you choose a good app name?

Post by idle »

pimpal
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Re: How do you choose a good app name?

Post by PB »

> do you mean "Personal information management"?

Yes, but it's not really aimed at that. The PIM is just part of it, for the times when I need info on a date, or to find someone's phone number in a hurry, etc. It does way more than that, sort of like a jack of all trades for PC use. Hard to describe, actually. When you see you'll understand. I just need a name so I can start working on the manual, which will have
screenshots, and I can't do the screenshots without finding the name first. :lol:

> pimpal

Yuck. And 48,000 hits with Google. I want 0 hits. :)
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Kaeru Gaman
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Re: How do you choose a good app name?

Post by Kaeru Gaman »

you did not comment the PI...
PB wrote:... 48,000 hits with Google. I want 0 hits.
forget Zero hits... what counts is no hits in the wanted context.
"pimpal" seems to be an Indish word and name from what I see at first glance.
compare it with my name. there are a lot of hits by other people, but those are icelandic words.
also mind the spelling.. call it PIM-Pal and it is unique.
oh... and have a nice day.
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Re: How do you choose a good app name?

Post by idle »

entodata 17 hits
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Vera
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Re: How do you choose a good app name?

Post by Vera »

Hi PB,

following an old saying - 'The answer lies within the question.' - I took an hour and tried to brainstorm on the clues of this thread. Like Kaeru said, using natural words quickly leads to thousands of results, as universal syllables do as well.
some suggestions wrote:PimAday (4 results) [like: 'an apple a day ...']
PimAddic (0 results) [from 'addicted' - as you implied]
JackAddic (0 results)
QuickAddic (4 results)
QuickAdic (2 results)
MyAdiccy (0 results)
Still, it would be helpfull to have more clues from you to play with. And as long you haven't got a name yet you could call it 'Unborn' while writing the manual and then a name might arise impulsively. :wink:

Greetings ~ Vera
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Re: How do you choose a good app name?

Post by PB »

> it would be helpfull to have more clues from you to play with

The name doesn't have to be specific to what the app does. In fact, I prefer that it doesn't. I like names that are one word, usually 8 letters or less (for DOS!), one or two syllables, and aren't found in a Google search. Like, apparently my family surname's crest motto is "the cautious wolf fears the snare", so I toyed with the idea of "Cauwolf", and even though that only has 58 Google hits, it looks hard to pronounce, and is probably hard for people to type in a search, or for when e-mailing a friend to download it. ;) (Besides, I then found lots of other surnames with the same motto, so it isn't so unique to my surname after all).

Also, this thread is not to pick a name for my specific app, it's just a discussion on how you guys choose names, to inspire my choices and the choices of others.
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Re: How do you choose a good app name?

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Rook Zimbabwe wrote:There is a little schmuck putz yankee moron MO-FO in Dallas
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Re: How do you choose a good app name?

Post by Joakim Christiansen »

Whenever I write a program I'll just take the least original and boring name and put JLC's in front of it, then I have no problems.
JLC's Internet TV
JLC's Media Player
JLC's CleanUp & TuneUp Utility
JLC's Radio Player
I don't see anything wrong with this at all. Why rather name a program "Keeboo" or something fancy that nobody will understand the meaning of? :lol:
I like logic, hence I dislike humans but love computers.
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Re: How do you choose a good app name?

Post by Blue Steel »

Big Companys usually run surveys internal or external for ideas

I generally use the innitials of the peogram.. eg: wow editor . "WE" or an AD&D Char editor "CADD" or I add in letters from specific unique features in the software along with what the general software does. and sometimes even scramble the letters eg: a folding Text editer "FTE" or "Fext" or "DEFT"

if its a game gennerally I call it the goal of the game or a combo of hero's/villans name aloing with the type of game again scrambled if neccessary to make a unique combo.

What ever you call it, IF its a great program you'll find that it'll get a following and clones will come out using what ever you chose as part of their title etc.. eg: look at how many Bejewled and Tetris clones are out there a lot with some form of the title ofc the original in it. So what ever you call it can become a house hold word.

The main thing is that your software (what ever you decide to call it) does what its supposed to in the most user friendly and stable manner (that you can think of or devise) thats why there are so many versions of just about any typer of software you can think of. because someone either didn't like the way that things were done in other software or that they liked methods used accross lots of other software but they weren't all together .. so they collated all the good ideas into one (or try to). IF you can create a piece of software that does all of the above it won't really matter what you call it. people will use it. The name of the software generally developes as the software does. ie: you don't think of the name at first it generally comes to you as your writting it or testing it. along from with other testers comments etc.. you'll find that software in testing stages that don't already have a name will be called several things from the testers and generally one or 2 will stick as it developes
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