The Name Game.

My group at work is involved in developing a new product. So, over the last (long) while, we had a contest to "name that product". The winner gets an iPod (mini? 4GB? 6GB? I don't know.). I came up with a whole slew of names around speed and acceleration in verification, which is what our product provides to customers. Below's the list of some of my suggestions -- some are good, some aren't. I've removed certain acronyms to protect the nature of the product.

1) Farina - driver to win the first Formula One race in 1950 (Italian fellow), indicative of speed
2) Burton - chief of current world record Nascar pit crew, shows speed and allows the driver to get on their way quicker
3) Cheetah - for obvious reasons, fastest land animal
4) Peregrine - for the Peregrine Falcon, the fastest animal on Earth with speeds up to 175 mph
5) Cascade - out ability to speed up verification cascades through to quicker time-to-market
6) FICESS - [acronym]
7) REVE - [acronym] (also means "dream" in French, Reve with ^ accent on first 'e')
8) ICDREE - [acronym]
9) Presto - A direction in sheet music indicating the tempo is to be very fast.
10) Allegro - A direction to play lively and fast. === used by Cadence
11) Glissando - A rapid succession of notes, often played on the piano or harp by sliding the fingers quickly over the keys or strings.
12) Scherzo - Pertaining to the sonata form, a fast movement in triple time.
13) VESPA - [acronym] -- sounds good, but is also the name of a scooter company in the USA
14) VESPAS - [acronym]
15) Protexcel - Excel in Prototyping (pronounced "pro-tex-cel")
16) Delorean - The time travel car in the Back to the Future series of movies
17) Asimov - For Isaac Asimov (1920 - 1992), a Science Fiction novalist and scholar
18) Fortengle - Forte___ (company) + "Engle", Madeleine L'Engle wrote a book called "A Wrinkle in Time" which is about cutting through time via a "wrinkle" (concept better shown in person), thereby getting from point A in time to point B in time much faster
19) Vitesse - French for Speed/Velocity
20) Arrow (System), Archer (Software), Crossbow (Hardware), Target (target board)
21) Derby (System), Stallion (Hardware),
22) RICESS - [acronym]

I think I narrowed this list down to 10 or so before submission. And then with all the suggestions of our group members, we narrowed it down even further before passing it up to the executives for a final decision.

The last word I got was that the race was between Presto (mine) and Forerunner (not mine). The company name that this will be marketed under is Forte____. I didn't even like Presto all that much as a name. So, in the interest of the iPod, I hope I win. But in the interest of the product, Forte____ Forerunner sounds much better.

Ah well, guess we'll just wait until the result is announced and hope I win. :)