You can choose a 'meaningless' name like Firefox or Google. But, people will seek meaning in a name whether you want them to or not. Google kind of reminds me of goggle or ogle, words associated with looking and searching. The latter is kind of appropriate, considering the amount of porn on the web. A really successful brand name will enter the dictionary. People talk about "googling" each other, but nobody would say "I xyplored you". But conversations would be more interesting if Page and Brin had kept the original name for their search engine "BackRub".
"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet." Not if it were called a "cankerwort" or "buttfuttock". But then those words would eventually become 'sweet-smelling', so that your sweetheart would be flattered if you called her a "cankerwort". Names matter.
People do judge books by their covers. That's why book covers have pictures and are all different. Total Commander sounds like it was coded by an adolescent in his Mum's basement, who'd rather be playing Command & Conquer or Counter-Strike, or chasing down monsters in labyrinths, playing Doom or Diablo or, indeed Total Annihilation, whose central character is called a Commander. [Note: I had to do extensive research to discover the names of these games. I would never waste my time on any of them.
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Make the name too long and people will abbreviate it anyway. Directory Opus is inevitably referred to as Dopus, which sounds like a word for a stupid person (i.e. a blend of dope and doofus). And as for XYplorer ...eh, let's not go there.
I'm guessing the name issue has resurfaced because XY has just become multilingual and whole new markets have opened up, full of people who have never heard of it.
I'm going to suggest a slightly enigmatic name, somewhat less testosterone charged than "Total Commander". Some might regard a name that requires an explanation as a bad thing but not if it gives the software reviewers something interesting to include in their posts. It might prompt them to revisit XYplorer, where a change of name alone was not enough.
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Looking for the best file manager? Here's a clue.
ARIANNE
Why 'Arianne'?
Arianne was the woman who gave Theseus a ball of thread to help him navigate the labyrinth in the famous Greek myth of the Minotaur. The story is the origin of the word "clue", something that helps you find what you're looking for. A ball of thread used to be called a "clew".
Suggested promotional text:
Arianne is a professional file manager that helps you navigate manifold file structures and find what your looking for.
It has a very powerful search engine with many different search criteria options.
Mark your files and folders with a range of tagging and highlighting options so that you can easily find your way back to them.
Etc.
Suggested promotional image:
Attractive, smiling, vaguely Greek looking, woman facing the reader and holding out a ball. The ball could be plain or a globe (i.e. the earth) or have multiple images on it suggestive of a large network of information (e.g. like the Wikipedia ball).
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Incidentally, the Theseus and Arianne story was very possibly the origin of Hansel and Gretel, with breadcrumbs replacing the thread. And thread is, of course, the underlying metaphor of computer terms like network and web.
As for using a girl's name for software, people seem to prefer anthropomorphized software to be female.
http://www.cnn.co.uk/2011/10/21/tech/in ... index.html
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The small print. There's always a catch.
Ariadne is the usual form in English. Ariadne.com was registered to Ariadne Internet Services, Inc., but the site appears to be down and the address expires on 02-Nov-2013. Ariadne.co is still available.
But I think the French Ariane sounds better. This is also the name of the European space rocket -a high tech association that is probably positive. But Ariane.com is taken.
Arianna is, I think, the Italian and transliterated Greek version. Again not as good, but using it would help you get a mention at the Huffington Post
Arianne is a much less common spelling, but looks better in English (i.e. its spelling is closer to how it is actually pronounced -these things can be a bit fuzzy in English). It is also further removed from 'aryan' -a word with unfortunate connotations.
Arianne.com is still available,
But "Arianne" is also is "a multiplayer online games framework and engine" on Sourceforge.
http://arianne.sourceforge.net/
I don't know if that's a dealbreaker. The Sourceforge project is non-commercial and a very different type of software. You could always talk to them.
Or you could name the software Arianne-XY, Ariane-XY or Ariadne-XY (with matching web address) where the "XY" provides some continuity or acknowledges it as a new incarnation of XYplorer. This would also provide a reference for all the XYs left over in the documentation e.g. XYcopy, the XYS script format, etc.
(I did not get the Huffington Post remark, though.) Female name -- great. Arianne is almost perfect in every regard. BUT: (1) I would find Ariadne much better. (It's also the German form of the name). To me Arianne clearly says: "Ariadne was not free anymore". (2) There is Sourceforge and some other companies using it. I have no time or resources for any sort of legal trouble. (3) The name calls for an explanation a bit too much. The immediate response to mentioning this name is very likely "Huh, why?". (4) Spelling is problematic, one always needs to say "Arianne with double-n" and will often end up spelling it. (5) No "XY" in it. That's not a deal breaker but would be nice to have.
