Re: 8.5 vs. 9.0, Postgres vs. PostgreSQL - Mailing list pgsql-hackers

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> As far as I can see, there is absolutely zero reason to care about
> whether the product is called Postgres or PostgreSQL.             

Sorry, but names matter. Advocacy matters. Please take a look in 
the archives on why this is so before making such a blanket      
statement.                                                       

> If it were called WeGrindUpTheBonesOfSmallChildrenSQL, maybe a 
> change would be worth considering.                             

Actually, that would be an improvement, because at least that's 
intuitively pronounceable, if a bit long. :)                    

> As it is, I submit that the product name is not on in the top 
> 10,000 things we should be worried about fixing               

Well, this *was* posted to -hackers and not -advocacy, but 
advocacy, mind share, and many other non-hacking-on-the-base-code things 
matter too. And frankly, our name is one of our *top* problems.          
Perhaps you've never had to explain to non-technical people how to       
pronounce it? Or sheepishly explained why we have such a lame,           
geeky sounding portmanteau? Or assured people that saying "Postgres"     
is perfectly fine, and that everyone says it that way anyway?            

>, even if there were a consensus that it were a good idea 
> (which there isn't)                                      

I beg to differ, the change has very wide support, including among 
members of -core. Please read the archives.                        

> and even if -core had not already made a decision on this point (which
> they have).

They punted, but there is no reason we can't revisit the topic. They
are certainly allowed to change their minds. :)

> What I think we SHOULD be worrying about right now is getting 9.0
> out the door, and I am 100% opposed to letting ourselves getting
> sucked into this or any other discussion which is likely to
> make that take longer than it likely already will.

What makes you think this is all a zero-sum game? You are free not to
get "sucked into this discussion", but remember that this is a
volunteer project, consisting of people with many and varied skills.
There are a small handful of people who are responsible for getting 9.0
out the door. There are thousands of other people who are working on
other Postgres-related things, including, at times, advocacy.

I'll move this over to -advocacy where it belongs, along with some
more concrete discussion of how we would make the name change,
when and if it happens.

- --
Greg Sabino Mullane greg@turnstep.com
PGP Key: 0x14964AC8 201001220952
http://biglumber.com/x/web?pk=2529DF6AB8F79407E94445B4BC9B906714964AC8
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