Ask HN: Great formulas for automatically generated usernames?

3 pointsseveibar3 comments

A lot of platforms and kids games use automatically generated user names to differentiate users and give a way for users to reference each other (e.g. Intercom uses this to identify chat users while they're anonymous. "Amber Pipe" or "Violet Scissors")

I think the main considerations are: 1) many combinations 2) fun and/or memorable for users

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Here's a simple method: combine a gist for 224 animals[1] and 166 colors[2] you get 37,184 user names. Not enough for tracking users, but maybe enough for sign ups for a B2B application. "Azure Yak", "Cream Turkey"

[1] https://gist.github.com/borlaym/585e2e09dd6abd9b0d0a [2] https://gist.github.com/mordka/c65affdefccb7264efff77b836b5e...

If you use this, be sure to exclude anything that could be combined with an animal to sound like a racial slur...

As someone who uses Azure I have done many an Azure yak shave!

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