Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

[Michael Schwendt]

On Thu, 13 Oct 2011 16:48:40 +0200, CW (Christoph) wrote:

> > > > > > > The Fedora 16 release name is: Beefy Miracle
> > > > > > 
> > > > > > Childish.
> > > > > 
> > > > > Why?
> > > > 
> > > > Well, try to explain it to the users without talking in riddles.
> > > 
> > > Have we ever explained names like Tettnang or Zod?
> > 
> > Of course, except that early Fedora release names have been decided on
> > without voting.
> > 
> > http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/History_of_Fedora_release_names
> > http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fedora-_und_Red-Hat-Versionsnamen
> 
> None of these links explains the actual choices, they just explain how
> the games works and what the connections are. 
> 
> Explaining the *name* doesn't mean to explain that Heidelberg is a City
> in the German state of Baden-Württemberg but why Heidelberg was chosen
> in favor of any other city in Baden-Württemberg.

You could have rephrased your question (above) where you wrote
"Have we ever explained names like Tettnang or Zod?".

I don't care whether any other city in DE-BW or DE would have met the
requirements in the same way. It doesn't interest me _why_ Tettnang had
been proposed or _why_ Krosno and Uzhgorod had been the other choices
besides Heidelberg. If it's a fun game for some people to enter the
"competition" with a personal favourite release name that meets the
requirements, I tolerate that.

When the release name process opened up, voters could learn about _what_ a
name is, what it refers to, and the connections (if disclosed in the Wiki).  
Later users of a Fedora release would also start with figuring out what a
name refers to and then possibly ask why it had been chosen. They would
look up "Heidelberg" and draw their own conclusions. What would you tell
them if they asked why the dist was named after a city? Would you point
them at the guidelines or mention that the _real why_ is a secret?

> > The Fedora Release name process has become much more open compared with
> > Red Hat Linux ( http://www.smoogespace.com/documents/behind_the_names.html ).
> > 
> > Even during the RHL era. Red Hat Linux users that tried to figure out
> > the connection between consecutive release names.
> 
> You see: You are again explaining the rules rather than the choices.

The rules are public and official. A person's self-motivation isn't --
when entering the release name voting process with a personal favourite
name, which may meet the requirements but have some secret rationale.

> While I have to admit that the connection is a little week this time,
> the name itself is easy to explain. It is more related to Fedora than
> any other name before.

And still you cannot avoid that users will find the story "childish" or
"silly". If they did, I would tolerate that.

Anyway, I don't think I want to hear the full story. Fragments of it
didn't sound too exciting. I do remember the pictures Anaconda displayed
during installation, such as the various hot-dog e.g. dancing "Limbo",
but why to continue there many years later, uhm... ;-)

-- 
Fedora release 16 (Verne) - Linux 3.1.0-0.rc9.git0.0.fc16.x86_64
loadavg: 0.06 0.04 0.07