How do you choose your project codename?

Question

We use code names to name branches and to have an easy way to reference the next version, before Marketing has decided what number or even name to give it when it is officially launched.

I have used names of planets, moons and cities, since they offer an easy successive list to choose from, and have even used names of STDs in an attempt to make sure the business doesn't choose the development code name for the actual release.

Do you do the same? If yes, how do you choose your code names? Which scheme works best, and why? If not, why not?

Answer 1

I tend to name my projects after a song I'm listening to a lot in development. Easily memorable and it's easy to look in iTunes and pick out a name quickly.

Answer 2

I use names of things from books I am currently reading. Like name of the fictional cities, characters and so on. I bet every scheme is great as long as you have a name that you can keep in mind and directly associate things to it.

Answer 3

On Cody's comment about memorable: Back when Ben Goodger was the lead developer for Firefox, a lot of Firefox releases were named after Auckland suburbs, where Ben was from. :-)

Answer 4

I choose a planet from the Star Trek Planets List :-)

Answer 5

If you're a huge music fan or movie-buff you could use band names, song names, or movie names I suppose, but those might seem a bit trivial. I do think it would be funny to walk into an office and ask "So how's Project Tarantula doing?" or "So how's the Dark Side of the Moon?"

Answer 6

Any two letter combination still available :) We like it short...

Answer 7

We typically use the names of geographical places of interest in the vicinity of our company's headquarters. River names, for instance, are used for new libraries, while the names of hills are used for winforms applications. We also try to not use too popular geographical sites, to make it less likely that they're used by other companies already (and google helps, too).

Answer 8

Norse mythology is a fun theme. "Project Thor" sounds like a powerful app, even though it's less than 100 lines of Python ;-)

Answer 9

Projects

We use bird names for our internal code names, I keep the RSPB's Birds of the British Isles book on my desk to make picking one easier. So far we have used:

• Coot
• Warbler
• Plover
• Quail
• Puffin
• Razorbill (our lead developer's favourite)

As you can see we pick them in a random order.

Servers

Our server names however are picked sequentially. We pick two schemes, one for physical servers and one for virtual servers, for example chocolate bars and vegetables. Then each time we install a new server we move up the alphabet from A-Z, when we run out of letters we pick a new scheme.

Answer 10

At first we had fun names. For projects we internally used poet names such as "project Poe" or "project Vogelweide". But as the projects (and the client base) grew we simply switched to flat names before the project had a real name and major / minor / build - numbers for the software (updates). The version, i.e. 2.03.047, is coded into the software so you can read it and get a development environment with exactly that code.

Anyway, life is too short not to have fun.

So, whenever possible I try to make a little fun with all who participate. Example: I was at a clients office and we talked about the new release. After everything was explained and we were allowed to release I took a phone, called the lead developer and said loudly: "Listen, the pigeons are flying backwards in spring, repeat, the pigeons are flying backwards."

I think this sounds better than "Release version 2.02.037, please."

Answer 11

We are an outsourcing company and have literally thousands of projects. So we like their names to be consistent and easy to remember. So we use a three-letters code (usually an abbreviation or acronym) for the customer followed by the three-four letters code of the project. This allows us to easily group the work we do for the same customer together and the names are suprisingly easy to read and remember. If it's a second phase it could get a numeric at the end.

So at the end we get something like:

<CST>-<CMS>[2]

Answer 12

Currently, we are using Greek Gods.

Answer 13

At one company I worked for, I suggested man-made disasters (eg: Project Titanic, or Project Hindenburg). Management didn't warm to this ;-)

Answer 14

I like to come up with a name, then invent a backronym for it. For example, I wrote a test framework and thought Spengler would be cool name, which stands for "Simple Procedures Examing New Gremlins Lowering Error Rates"

More examples

• Mozart - "Media Objects Zoning And Redundancy Technology"
• Corelli - "Cd Ordering REplication Labelling Listing & Invoicing"
• Brahms - "Batch Recording ArcHive Management System"

Some people suspect I spend more time on the acronym than writing the software. That couldn't be true, could it?

Answer 15

I base it on Roman gods/titans. Quoting from my blog:-

Alright. So I’m calling my compiler framework ‘Kronos‘ after the Roman titan of “human time”, since this project is consuming my life and will continue to do so for a long time, possibly years; and as such is a collosal commitment of my, very human time :-).

Kronos was raised up by the Romans from a Greek titan of chaos and disorder. Here is another analogy that resonates with me, right up until now I have been chaotic in my approach to developing myself as a programmer, this framework represents a real ordered commitment.

Answer 16

Apple Project Names

Answer 17

Microsoft Project Names

Answer 18

Jeff's Ideas from his blog entry :)

• Types of Food
• Video games (Atari 2600, Arcade, etc)
• Brands of Beer
• Roman Emperors
• Cartoon characters / shows
• Mythological names / gods
• Cars
• GUIDs (a personal favorite)
• Gemstones
• Types of Coffee drinks
• States
• Counties
• Plants
• Hitchcock films
• Dog breeds
• Colors
• Famous Explorers
• Trees
• IRS Tax Forms
• English monarchs
• Famous People (eg, Sagan)
• Wikipedia article names
• Single letters (including unicode)
• Radio alphabet
• Candy brands
• Dinosaurs
• Historical Sites
• City street names
• IKEA product names
• Types of Fasteners (nut, bolt, rivet, etc)
• Ski resorts
• National Parks
• Mountain Peaks
• World War II era ships
• Birds
• Beaches
• Bridges
• Web 2.0 names
• Warcraft realm names
• Cheeses
• Countries
• Cereal brands

Answer 19

In my company, we use names of rivers. Our latest project was called "Project Nile". Has a nice ring to it :)

For my personal projects, I usually go with something descriptive of the code I'm writing. E.g.: "JavaScriptSelectPopulate", "JavaScriptDataTableAbstraction", etc.

Answer 20

I was using Beatles songs for a while, on a project a few years ago.

...Helter Skelter ...Glass Onion ...Dear Prudence ...Rocky Racoon

Answer 21

Paul Dixon's comment about backronyms reminds me of another theme for naming projects: see Sub-engines of SCUMM. :-P

Answer 22

How about conspiracy theories? Project codenames such as ODESSA, Majestic-12, MKULTRA... Ooh! Project Reptilian Humanoid!

No way management would allow code names like those outside of the company. Which might lead to another code name in the conspiracy theory series.