Fedora Sway OSTree Spin name

 August 12, 2022

The Fedora Sway SIG is working to create an immutable version of the Sway Spin (also work in progress) using OSTree.

Those immutable spins of Fedora are becoming more common following Silverblue and Kinoite’s success.

As it often happens, one of the most challenging things to do in creating something is to come up with clever names. This task is made even more complex by the relatively small amount of people active in this conversation. For this reason, during the last SIG meeting, it was decided to socialize this decision so that more people could suggest their ideas.

We are looking for a name that has general similarities with “Sway” (i.e., starts with ’s' or sounds similar) as well as feels similar to the other OSTree Fedora versions (i.e.: a blu mineral):

Vauxite (XFCE)
Kinoite (KDE)

At the moment, the best name we have come up with so far is “Sodalite”.

You have time until Tuesday the 23rd of August 2022 to propose names and comment on the proposed ones.

The ways you can submit your proposals are the following:

comment under this post
reply to the threads in the Devel or Sway-SIG mailing lists
reply on Fedora Discussion
reply on the reddit thread on /r/swaywm or /r/Fedora

 Fedora, Linux

 ImmutableOS, Sway

Say something

Comments

Matt Armstrong on 2022-08-13 09:07:15 UTC said:

I may be boring and taking all the fun out of it, but I am generally more pleased when names are more clear. Not sure why a spin of Silverblue with “Foo” instead of Gnome needs an entirely new (although, playful) name. Maybe this:

Fedora Silverblue Gnome Fedora Silverblue KDE Fedora Silverblue Sway Fedora Silverblue LXDE

Boring but clear names. 😀

But, within the spirit of the existing approach “Sodalite” is pretty good. 👍🏻

Fabio Alessandro Locati on 2022-08-13 09:10:04 UTC said:

Although, in a way, I do agree, I also see the value of different names that make it easier for users to understand that those artifacts are very different. I guess the real question would be how different they are. I think that today are still fairly different beause OSTree is still a new technology, and over time they will become more and more standard, as the various “standard” spins already are. Thanks for your input :-).

Furkan on 2022-08-14 22:02:31 UTC said:

FYI sodalite is being used by https://github.com/sodaliterocks for Pantheon Desktop on Silverblue although its not a spin yet AFAIK there is an attempt.

Fabio Alessandro Locati on 2022-08-15 06:37:21 UTC said:

Thanks Furkan for this information. I was not aware of this project!

Gabriel Figueroa on 2022-08-16 05:59:15 UTC said:

I have read your requirements and I think Sodalite is a solid, catchy choice. However, I would suggest to go against the decision of naming it after another blue mineral. Hear my pitch:

Silverblue’s logo resembles a leaf as a way to reference its use of Ostree. Before they settled on the project’s name, they were looking for words relating trees(!!), atoms, physics, nature, landscapes, etc. At one point it was even going to be called Silverleaf, another nod to Ostree. (Source: Silverblue’s documentation - FAQ | Team Silverblue - The Origins)

Kinoite’s name does come from a blue mineral that starts with K, much like you guys are aiming to replicate. However, another meaning exists within that name: it seems to also mean “There is a tree” in japanese. Yet another nod at Ostree. (Source: Kinoite’s documentation - FAQ)

I understand the intention of creating a sense of cohesion between Fedora’s immutable spins. But perhaps there is something to gain if you go for the route i’m hinting at. Maybe said cohesion can instead be obtained by referencing the Ostree system within it’s name. Something that cannot be done with Sodalite (for all I know).

Not to mention Sway’s logo is also a tree (an Acacia?). Between a mineral or a tree, the latter one makes much more sense thematically for this WM. While I believe KDE’s idea of Kinoite was rather smart, I don’t think their idea should become your guidelines. Vauxite as a name has no discernible connection with XFCE, i do not think it is a reasonable name.

Having said all that, here are my suggestions. They are all based of trees/plants names, present in the Wikipedia page of ‘Silverleaf’, that also start with the letter S. Names can always be lightly modified in order to keep a brand more iconic.

Sericea - My main choice. This tree can be contorted or ‘bent’ like sway’s tree logo.
Serratifolia - Could be modified to ‘Serrate’. This tree’s flowers are known for being similar to the Acacia’s, which I think it’s Sway’s tree logo.
Silvicola - Could be modified to ‘Sylvico’.
Saccharinum - Could be modified to ‘Sackary’.

If you’ve read this far, but are still not impressed with my pitch, then I’d like to suggest ‘Sapphire’ and ‘Spinel’, both blue minerals. The latter is the less known, so it would be a good fit, as it would be easily associated with the project once it launches. I apologize for the length of my comment and wish you the best in this endeavor.

Fabio Alessandro Locati on 2022-08-16 06:11:56 UTC said:

Thanks a lot Gabriel for your comment, it’s a very interesting point of view the one that you are expressing, and I like the reasoning behind it. We’ll surely discuss it in the next meeting!

Katherine on 2022-08-16 08:29:06 UTC said:

If you want a relatively unique name, but something recognizable, I would probably go with something like Fedora Swaytree, just because it makes life simple. I’m sure cooler names will be found, but Fedora Sway + Fedora Swaytree are decent pragmatic picks.

Fabio Alessandro Locati on 2022-08-16 08:35:38 UTC said:

Thanks a lot Katherine, we’ll consider this option as well!

allaeddine on 2022-08-16 11:44:51 UTC said:

you cant use sodalite, it’s already taken by an unofficial pantheon spin

Fabio Alessandro Locati on 2022-08-16 12:23:18 UTC said:

Hi allaeddine, yes, Furkan cited it as well. This will clearly need to be taken in consideration!

Rey on 2022-08-16 21:51:16 UTC said:

Honestly, the naming is so unintuitive, I would have NEVER knew a Kinoite was Silverblue KDE if I didn’t explicitly search it after knowing the name for months. I thought it was just another random fedora spin. If we want adoption, simple names that are recognisable without searching them up would be so much better.

If you were to unify everything under the Silverblue banner that would be the easiest, since it is known that Silverblue is the immutable OS.

If we really need these rock names, we could have Silverblue Kinoite. Immediately obvious it’s immutable and some kind of edition. Silverblue Vauxite, Silverblue Sodalite these sound good, and should be shown alongside Silverblue.

And maybe Silverblue gnome gets to be Silverblue Gilalite or Gordaite or Grandideritr.

Rey on 2022-08-16 21:56:45 UTC said:

Reading Gabriel’s comments, I really like the idea of leaf, tree and plant names. It fits the idea of ostree, and plant names are usually so much more elegant than rocks. It’s a more future proof naming scheme.

Rey on 2022-08-16 23:08:18 UTC said:

Sorry, one more post. Examples using just trees:

Silverblue Sweetgum (Sway). or maybe Silverblue Sakura. Sassafras? Silverblue Xylomelum (XFCE). Bushwillow or Banyan (Budgie) Maple (MATE), Katsura or Kaikomako (KDE), Linden (LXQt), Cypress or Cedar (Cinnamon), Poplar or Paperbark (Pantheon), Silverblue Grand Fir (Gnome)

Well, as long as there is good communication about the different desktop environments, it should be fine. Like Kinoite and Silverblue should reference each other in their websites.

Jeremy Kanto on 2022-08-16 23:22:24 UTC said:

I don’t like rocks or trees or whatever. I think just Silverblue Gnome, silverblue KDE, Silverblue Sway, etc. they’re still elegant…

Fabio Alessandro Locati on 2022-08-17 06:58:49 UTC said:

Thanks Rey and Jeremy for your comments, very interesting points!

Jamie Locksmith on 2022-08-17 10:36:26 UTC said:

It doesn’t have to just be trees… it can be plants too since plants also branch out… rocks are also cool but sodalite is used by a pantheon spin already

Fabio Alessandro Locati on 2022-08-17 11:22:06 UTC said:

Thanks James for your comment!

From the many comments I see, there seems to be some friction with the current naming schema, though I wonder if we are still in time to have that broader conversation of if that ship already sailed with Kinoite.

Jamie Locksmith on 2022-08-17 20:08:22 UTC said:

I think the kind of people who reply to this thread are probably a loud minority so keep that in mind.

People know silverblue as THE immutable OS so I might suggest a simplification to Silverblue Vauxite, Silverblue Kinoite, etc.

I used to use Arch, and it was so easy when you can google one name and get help results. A new user might search Fedora Vauxite how to xyz and get no results, but if you search silverblue xyz you can find the most answers because silverblue gnome is so much more popular, and the known name for everything. Everything is team silverblue, is there some team kionite

If all the spins are shown on the same website (which they aren’t right now confusingly) then it would be very obvious what they are, and I don’t think there would be any problem with the naming convention. The Kionite website is really nice I hope Silverblue Gnome can get that treatment.

Silverblue Gnome doesn’t have a rock name so it technically isn’t consistent.

I really like the name Sodalite too. What about Sapphire, that’s a stone too?

Fabio Alessandro Locati on 2022-08-17 20:30:28 UTC said:

Thanks Jamie, you make some very good points!

Both Sodalite and Sapphire are minearls, so it would work well too. I would say that generally speaking, the blue(ish) minerals starting with S are:

So all those would be matching those criteria, if we stick to them. I’m a little bit skeptical on Sapphire mostly due to its huge popularity.

Naadi on 2022-08-20 21:44:53 UTC said:

“Sombrero”

It’s a kind of hat, as Fedora is And it starts with letter S

Fabio Alessandro Locati on 2022-08-21 06:57:03 UTC said:

Thanks Naadi for the suggestion. If we move to naming spins with hats, surely “Sumbrero” will be on top of our lists :-).

Martin C. on 2022-10-04 22:38:28 UTC said:

Hi Fabio,

This is really good news!

Are you guys open to external contributors? Also, do you happen to have any working ISO I can put my sweaty claws on to give it a try?

Fabio Alessandro Locati on 2022-10-06 19:12:41 UTC said:

Absolutely Martin, we are open to any kind of contributors! You can find current ISO images here.