Finding a New Name for TextScript

Quick Update

Hello world, it has been about a week since my last blog. Currently, I am spending most of my free time every day searching for a place to live. It has been a rather stressful ordeal because one of my room mates needs to move out in two weeks (the rest of us in six weeks), so we have been racing to find a place so they aren’t homeless. Unfortunately, the current rental market is a bit crazy. Rent prices are extremely expensive, even with four room mates, and the actual application process is difficult. We are at the mercy of the landlords who ultimately decide if we will have a roof over our heads or not. This has been taking away from my free time I would otherwise spend on projects and blogging, so I can’t wait for this time to pass soon enough and be in my past. Anyways, this blog is all about a search for a new name to go with the new version of TextScript.

Why the name change?

The biggest problem with the name TextScript is it sounds like some simple script a programmer came up with. Programmers are usually more interested in the actual functionality of a program and seldom pay any thought to the name. The objective of this blog post is to find a try to find a better name than TextScript.

What a name needs

Any open source project needs a good name, but I personally find this part harder than developing the actual application. There are a lot of questions you have to consider. For example:

Is the name easily pronouncable?

I learned about the importance of having a pronouncable name at my current company. We use a video conferencing platform called “Pexip” which somehow is impossible for many of our customers and users to pronounce. I have heard people say pexit, pexpit, pextip, and all sorts of other variations. While the name isn’t too hard for me to pronounce, the real test of a name is if a majority is able to pronounce it.

Does the name sound right for the project?

This section is pretty simple. An ideal name should sound similar to function. As much as I dislike the company, an example of this is “Facebook”. Another example is “Microsoft Teams”. Both of these names hint at the actual function or purpose of the application.

This said, some products like Firefox and Spotify sound nothing like what they do, so it’s not unreasonable to use

Has the name already been trademarked?

This part is hard for me. I have come up with so many names that sound unique only to find out someone beat me to the punch. Trademark law isn’t easy to understand either, so it’s usually not a good idea to risk a name similar to an existing project or company.

The Search for a Name

CogiText

I came up with CogiText when I read about the Cogitors from the Dune novels. The cogitors were scientists of the Old Empire who chose to transfer their brains into preservation chambers, and continue to expand scientific knowledge for humanity. TextScript stores text in a shortcut so it seemed too good to pass up.

Alas, I found a french company with the name CogiTexte which performs translation services. It sounds way too close, so I moved on.

CogniText

One of my friends suggested this one as an alternative to CogiText. This one has the benefit of being easier to pronounce, but it had the same issue as the first. It already exists.

CogniTome

I really liked the first part “Cogni” so I tried changing text. I searched for synonyms of book, and found the word “tome” which sounds pretty good. I looked this up in google and it turns out that this is the name of a Final Fantasy XIV item. I don’t think items like this are trademarked, especially since the game has thousands of items.

A New Tactic

I’m going to try to split up the parts of CogniTome and find some synonyms. Maybe I can combine them to make some new names.

Seed Words

• Mnemonic
• Fathom
• Memo
• Memoir
• Prompt
• Codex
• Tome
• Omnibus
• Opus
• Scroll
• Information
• Phrase
• Idiom
• Diction
• Formulate
• Morpheme
• Lexeme
• Cue
• Scry
• Dictate
• Edict
• Template

Combinations

• MnemoniCodex (Too long)
• MnemoniDex
• MnemoniCue
• Memomnibus (Hard to pronounce)
• Memodex
• Texdex
• Memorpheme (Might be hard to pronounce)
• Morpheme (Tried the word alone)
• FormulaTome (Sounds weird)
• MemoTome (Sounds okay)
• PhraseMemoir (Too close to PhraseExpress)
• InforMemoir (Sounds weird)
• OmniTome (Also in Final Fantasy XIV)
• DracoTome (I was watching Dragon Heart)
• Tempdex (Sounds okay)
• Cognizone (or Cognizome)
• Cognidex (Not bad)
• LexDex (Symmetrical)
• OmniDex (Taken)
• Mnemonicum (Hard to pronounce)
• Ubiquidex (Hard to pronounce)

Getting Closer

So one of my close friends gave me a great suggestion. She said that my project reminds her of a rolodex, so why not something with the word “dex” in it? I looked up words that end in “co” so that it would seamlessly blend into “codex”.

• Arcodex (Sounds awesome, but exists already)
• Starcodex (Modified arcodex, but only sounds okay)

I felt that I was getting closer.

Macacodex

I was convinced this was the one. I imagined a logo that looks like a minimalistic version of the macaco selfie:

I ran this by my friend and she said she liked it, but suggested a more serious name:

Simidex

I really like this name for several reasons. First of all, it is easy to say. I checked online, and I couldn’t find any companies or products with this name. Best of all, I can still use a minimalistic monkey logo.

5 Hours Later

I told you coming up with names is hard for me. After five hours and three movies in the background (The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, Dragon Heart, and They Live), I came up with a bunch of terrible names, some decent ones that were taken, and one that I really like: SimiDex. I am going to run this by a few more people to get some feedback, but there’s a pretty good chance I’m going to roll with this one.

Next Steps

The next step is a decent logo. I wanted something simple and minimalistic like the FireFox logo, but I’m thinking of looking up pictures of wise looking apes as opposed to silly looking ones. I am also planning to hire my friend to make the logo at market rates. She is a very talented artist, and I have always believed in investing in my friends. I hope I can post an update with the finished logo soon!

Well, for now, I’m going to wrap up this blog. I know it was different than my usual tech blogs, but this was a necessary step in order to continue my series on my new project, the SimiDex. In the future, you can look up the SimiDex category to see the whole series.

Until next time!