ShowHN: Naming Tool | Hacker News Reader

ShowHN: Naming Tool

7 pointssamerbuna7 comments

One of the things people spend a lot of time stressing about is coming up with names for things (projects, companies, books, etc).

We've created a tool to help with that process. It allows you to create an entry to solicit names for your project (which you can share with your team / friends, or make public for others to participate).

Another challenge is picking the name. Often it's done sort of random, based on what people think sounds the best. We put together a scoring system that is the core part of naming consultations that usually costs $$$. You can evaluate the name on each of the different dimensions and then have a more thorough understanding of the name you choose.

We'd love your feedback on the concept, execution, etc. as well as suggestions / criticisms.

There is an option for a "premium" entry -- if you'd like to use that feature, use code HACKER to get it for free.

https://bootname.com/

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The multi-dimensional scoring is probably the best part of this tool, as it forces you to think about the context in which you are naming your company -- vs. just disliking something because it has an emotional trigger in one of the founders / advisors.

Pretty cool idea. Added one for testing :)

How long does a free entry stay on the front page for?

Right now, we have a simple algorithm that ranks front-page entries based on their type and age, older entries would eventually be pushed down the stack as new ones comes in.

However, we've been contemplating a voting process on the entries themselves and then have the algorithm use that, some entries are worth the public attention more than others.

Thanks for testing!

Is there a way to edit entries after they've been entered? I have a tendency to make typos (which I made on my entry) and don't see any way to edit the description.

One feature you could add (maybe premium) is the ability for the entry creator to see if domain names are available for suggested names. I had one name suggestion for my entry and this is the first thing I did.

Wish you the best luck and success with this!

There should be and edit icon to the left of the title when you view the entry as the owner, maybe we should make that a bit more obvious.

Thanks for suggesting the domain name check, we've been thinking about that and how to make it useful to users brainstorming names, as well as for names already proposed. It's definitely something we have on the queue.

Thanks, found the edit icon.

I honestly wasn't expecting to find it in the title line though. Maybe you could add a button with the text "edit" below the description to the right of the constraints? That's more where I expected to find it. That or just make it stand out more.

One final suggestion for the UI (please keep in mind I'm not a designer and therefor you can freely ignore my opinion if you want), the left side is a lot more content heavy then the right side of the screen on the entry page. Maybe move the "Got a cool name for this?" section underneath the listed names on the right side?

That's not a bad idea at all. Thanks!

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