Mandrakesoft Changes Name to Mandriva

joestar writes "Following its recent merger with Conectiva, Mandrakesoft has decided to change its name to 'Mandriva' for two reasons: "1. The recent Mandrakesoft - Conectiva merger calls for a new identity that better represents the combination of two key companies and their global presence. 2. The long-winding trademark lawsuit with Hearst Corporation has reached a point where we decided it is more reasonable for us to move forward.". Mandrake is dead, long life to Mandriva!"

Well

[paranode]

I preferred Conedrakesoft, but... whatever...

Re:Well

[ImaLamer]

Cone drakesoft?

Well, it is from France!

Re:Well

[Sporkinum]

I guess the "World" is not familiar with old SNL references, but I thought it was a good joke.

Re:Well

[sharkey]

urpmi --update mass-quantities

Re:Well

[Afrosheen]

Moron. He's making a joke about the awful Coneheads movie..when asked where they're from, the Coneheads reply 'we're from France'.

Re:Well

[woobieman29]

Movie?

How about the long-running SNL skit that was actually quite funny? Never saw the movie, as SNL spinoff movies have a pretty low rate of success these days. For every decent one (Wayne's World, Night at the Roxbury) You have loads of crap (Ladies Man, SuperStar, etc) that have "diluted the brand" pretty badly.

Con is French slang for cunt.

[crovira]

I suspect that the joke was a little more low-brow than what you thought.

Good they renamed it, but will QA follow?

[ArsenneLupin]

The name change was needed. Indeed, in Luxembourgish, Mandrake litterally means "my trash". And given Mandrake's low reliability the name stuck...

Just let's hope, that with the new name, they'll also improve their QA...

It's better than a few other alternatives, though.

[jd]

Here are other names they might have used...

• ConMan (well, depending on the quality of the merge)
  
• Drake Connect (useful if anyone wants to set up a Romanized dragon dating servce)
  
• IvaSoft (Adult themes get searched more than anything else)
  
• Floccinaucinihilipilihication [fun-with-words.com] would seem to be appropriate, as would Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis. These would seem to be much more memorable.
  

Re:Well

[MightyMartian]

That is the dumbest goddamn name I've ever heard. The distro's pretty good, but the name... the name... Why that blood name?

Re:Well

[LarsWestergren]

Damn, they actually went ahead and did it. If they had to have a compound name, couldn't they at least have picked Mantiva? On the Mandrake mailing lists, most people seemed to be in favour of that one.

The only Google reference to Mantiva is an Italian family name. If I associate it with anything in English, its "mantis".

Re:Well

[badmammajamma]

Apparently Mangina was taken.

Some names I suggested to Mandrakesoft

[Anand_S]

Mandrakesoft was obviously intent on combining "Mandrake" with "Connectiva" for the new name, so I came up with the following:

1. Condrakula
2. ConMan
3. MaC OS 10.2

Re:Well

[eln]

Company names should be fairly nonsensical like this. Naming the company something Linux-ish ties them to exclusively Linux-based products. This is a bad idea not because it's Linux, but because it ties the company to a particular type of product, which limits their ability to spread the brand to other products. Note that most of the "Linux only" companies of the dot-com era (the ones that actually survived) changed their names to something more generic.

Re:Well

[MissTuxie]

wish I had mod points. Why do most people think naming their company "websomething" or "something something net" is gonna make them sound edgy? Most good sticky names derive from the silliest things. And do not tie you to anything in particular. Look at google and Yahoo, for instance.

Re:Well

[dgatwood]

I can't help but think of Dilbert's merger of Pathway Electronics with E-Technology Co. to form the Path-E-Tech Cormpany....

Maybe it's just me.

Re:Well

[Stevis]

Not to mention when they randomly generate a company name by combining astronomical and electrical engineering terms, and get "Uranus-Hertz."

Re:Well

[Garg]

Not to mention the Google factor... a made-up name ensures anyone looking for you will find you without a bunch of irrelevant hits.

Garg

Quickly browsing the dictionary...

[emil]

A little too close for comfort.

drivel - To slobber; drool. To flow like spittle or saliva. To talk stupidly or childishly.

trivia - Something of small importance.

Re:Well

[slimak]

Right, like Motorola:

Galvin Manufacturing Corporation founder Paul V. Galvin creates the brand name "Motorola" for the company's new car radio, linking "motor" (motorcar, motion) with the suffix "ola" (sound). (source [motorola.com])

After changing the company name to Motorola in the 1940's, Motorola has only been able to make car radios.

What about Microsoft? They make hardware and large software products.

American Airlines flies internationally (but I guess I wouldn't rent a car from them)

Dunkin Donuts sells cof

Re:Well

[B'Trey]

It was bad enough when your company was named after a duck instead of a penguin.

A duck? A drake is a male duck, but a mandrake is a poisonous plant that is supposed to have magical powers, probably because it's root looks like a human figure. Didn't you ever play King's Quest?

Is there something I'm missing or is this duck thing just confusion because of the word "drake" being in the name?

Re:Well

[Otter]

I think the distribution's name is actually a reference to Mandrake the Magician [kingfeatures.com], not to the plant. Hence the magic-related imagery that used to surround Mandrake Linux, and is still present in the star logo.

(I can't believe that strip is still around! Do comic strips ever stop? Does anyone still read Barney Google or Rex Morgan?)

BTW, a somewhat more timeless mandrake reference is Genesis 30:14.

Re:Well

[B'Trey]

Not that you mention it, I seem to recall hearing that before. That's what the copyright lawsuit in the story is referring to. Still, Mandrake the Magician is a human being, not a duck. And I'll bet that Mandrake the Magician was named after mandrake, the magical plant.

Really?

[hey!]

I always thought it was a crappy pun on John Donne:

Go and catch a falling star,
Get with child a mandrake root,
Tell me where all past years are,
Or who cleft the devil's foot,
Teach me to hear mermaids singing,
Or to keep off envy's stinging,
And find
What wind
Serves to advance an honest mind.

Mandrake - root -- unix? Get it? Blech.

Re:Really?

[h4rm0ny]

MOD PARENT: +5 Metaphysical.

Re:Well

[Agrippa]

Cheer up. It could of been renamed to "Manspire".

.agrippa.

Re:Well

[Anonymous Coward]

...gentoo is a penguin, just thought you should know.

Re:Well

[MikeMacK]

It sounds too much like this [imdb.com] and I know that can't be good for business!

April Fools?

[BJZQ8]

April Fools Day was the 1st...Oh wait, they're serious.

Re:April Fools?

[xanthines-R-yummy]

It's April 1st there. They're in a different time zone!

Oh, wait...

Harddriva?

[brontus3927]

So will all their *Drake tools now be *Driva tools? It just doesn't have the same ring to it.

Re:Harddriva?

[paranode]

Don't forget to compile the kernel modules for your SoundDriva too.

Re:Harddriva?

[CrackHappy]

Now THAT is funny as hell.

What an accent you have, is that French?

Re:Harddriva?

[Amoeba]

Don't forget to compile the kernel modules for your SoundDriva too.

And do you pronounce Mandriva as "Man-drive-ah" or as "Man-dree-vah"? I'm thinking the first one would be best cause, Snap G! I gots my Soundriva up n running in dis mofo.

Uh.. nevermind.

Re:Harddriva?

[rbochan]

But they can now refer to their mailing lists as Mandrivel ;o)

Re:Harddriva?

[2old2rockNroll]

They have been renamed to the equally girly "Duck Tools"

So the backup program is now called Duck Tape? Sorry.

Stupidest. Name. Evar.

[criscooil]

They should have called it "Firebird Linux".

Great name!

[waynegoode]

Mandriva

I'm sure glad they didn't pick some wimpy combination of Mandrake and Conectiva. Now the three top distros at Distrowatch [distrowatch.com] (choose last 3 months) will all have great-sounding, easy-to-pronounce names:

1. Ubuntu
2. Mandriva
3. Mepis

Re:Great name!

[Stevyn]

Ubuntu, sounds like a baseball strategy.

Mandriva, sounds like a bunch of guys driving down the road

Mepis, Me piss?

At least I can say, "well Gentoo is a species of penguins you ignorant pisser."

Re:Great name!

[UrgleHoth]

Well, on the topic of great sounding distros, How about naming one "Cthulhu" (barring any existing copyright issues). Bonus would be the slogan, "Cthulhu Linux, it'll suck your face off."

Cthulhu Linux

[Kozar_The_Malignant]

>Bonus would be the slogan, "Cthulhu Linux, it'll suck your face off."

I like it. I can think of several other excellent marketing themes:

• Cthulhu Linux - Use it or else.
• Cthulhu Linux vs. Microsoft - Why settle for the lesser evil?
• Cthulhu Linux - Bringing the fear of computers back into your life.
• Cthulhu Linux - Wait 'til you experience our Blue Screen of Death.

Re:Great name!

[ScoLgo]

Say what you will. I'm just glad they kept the 'r' in there. Otherwise, their mascot might've been John Madden dressed like Mariah Carey.

Yipes!!

Re:Great name!

[Cecil]

Please visit a mechanic immediately, your sarcasm detector is badly malfunctioning.

Man-driva!

[nightsweat]

Man...driva, wider than a mile
I'm crossing you in style, someday

This is a belated April Fool's joke, right? That's the dumbest name since International Harvester became Navistar.

Re:Man-driva!

[nightsweat]

Troll? How does this get rated a troll? No seriously, I don't get it.

Man-drivel?

[kpharmer]

Just don't get this - what kind of a brainstorming session did these guys have?

mansnivel?
mansnot?
manmucus?
manbile?
manslurry?
mandribble?

mandriven?
mandriver?
mandriveme?
man-drivin' female?

Just like my old scout, I'll probably just go on calling it what I've always called it- Mandingo.

Re:Man-driva!

[horza]

It has to be a late April Fool that got stuck in the spool. What a load of Mandriva-l. They should have merged the best bits of both names and named the company: Mandrake. I agree with an above poster than when the names behind the merger are forgotten you are just going to end up with a bad name.

Phillip.

And furthermore...

[PCM2]

Ol' Man-driva
Dat Ol' Man-driva
He mus' know sumpin'
But don' say nuthin'
He jes' keeps rollin'
He keeps on rollin' along

Re:Man-driva!

[nightsweat]

I don't understand your comment, but great handle!

My Recommendation

[qw(name)]

The new company should be called SoftCone.

Sigh

[wigle]

Another awkwardly named software company.. when will they learn to at least pronounce it first?

Is that the best they could do?

[Moby Cock]

Mandriva!?!

That name sucks. Is this the best they could come up with. Conetidrake would've been better.

When two companies merge and they change the name, that is an opportunity to come up with a really good name. Mandrake was a good name. Connectiva was a bad name. Mandriva is worse.

*sigh*

Re:Is that the best they could do?

[Erwos]

While I don't think Connectiva was a _bad_ name, I agree with your sentiment that they really dropped the ball on this one. Mandriva only makes sense in the context of a single, little-known corporate merger. In a couple years, it'll be just a bad name.

Dragonux, for example, would have been a better choice. It conjures thoughts of both UNIX/Linux and the dragon - fearsome in some cultures, a harbringer of good luck in others. It also plays on Mandrake's old name.

Mandriva plays on Mandrake's old name, but

Re:Is that the best they could do?

[Dun Malg]

I think you found the one worse name they could have gone with.

Conetidrake?

Nah there are plenty worse:
Comandrake (they manage gardeners, right?)
Manconnect (gay dating service?)
Condrake (AKA conservative [google.com] linux)
Mandiva (Drag queen lounge singer?)
Mancondrakectiva (some sort of respiratory infection?)

Not to say they couldn'y have done better than they did...

They can't be serious!

[Anonymous Coward]

What's more ridiculous than this name?

Maybe Linspire...

Re:They can't be serious!

[mikael]

There was a sofa store that was sued for putting up a poster claiming themselves to be "sofa-king-good". [asa.org.uk]

Sounds like...

[mikefoley]

...the name of a tranny stripper..

Eeesh...

Re:Sounds like...

[Mr Guy]

I read it as "Man dree vuh" and thought it sounded like a small Eastern bloc country occupied by the Soviets after World War II.

Do you haf za news from Mandreevah!

Dah! Vee haf crushed da reseestance in Mandreevah! Long live mother Russia!

Re:Sounds like...

[idontgno]

Ah, Mandriva, the even more impoverished and backward neighbor of Molvania [molvania.com].

Re:Sounds like...

[Mad_Rain]

I read it as "Man dree vuh" and thought it sounded like a small Eastern bloc country occupied by the Soviets after World War II.

I can't believe no one has said this yet:

In Soviet Russia, Mandriva renames YOU!

ew, now I feel all... dirty. Blech.

Hmm

[bogie]

Mandriva? How ahh European...

In Mandriva company changes name to _________!

Represents WHAT???

[hesiod]

> the recent Mandrakesoft - Conectiva merger calls for a new identity that better represents the combination of two key companies and their global presence.

How does "Mandriva" "represent their Global Presence?" If I had no idea what they made and was asked to guess, it would be some sort of male driving school... Or a singing fruit (mandarin, Diva)... But in no way does Mandriva make me think "Linux, of course!"

Re:Represents WHAT???

[0racle]

Yes, its a terrible name that one does not associate with Linux. They should have chosen a name like Maya, Excel, Trivoli, Firefox, Bryce or Java. You know names that don't just set a product apart but immediatly discribe what it does.

Re:Represents WHAT???

[0racle]

Mandrake is supposedly big in France. Conectiva is big in Brazil. Both are at least known of around the world. They combined the two to have a name that has parts of well known names but is not currently tied to any main geographic location then they told the world, or at least the parts that cared. Seems pretty global to me.

No self-respecting man would install "mandriva"

[Anonymous Coward]

I mean, come on. This is a name just asking to be picked on. I wonder if I'll someday be able to install mandriva on my performa. That would be awesomea.

Unless this is a method for hardening its security-- y'know, everyone picks on mandriva, so it has to toughen itself up. Like naming your son Sue or something.

this is totally stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

"mandriva" just sounds ridiculous. Nobody is going to remember it. They may as well have called it:

236176911b0bc7fca6bae20804ba08d9

which is what I get from

echo mandriva |md5sum

and is about as easy to remember.

Next up....

[cprincipe]

Noveluse

Re:Next up....

[ediron2]

The correct spelling is Novluser. You left off the 'r'.

Trust a shareholder.

It has to be Novelsusimian.

[melted]

They've bought Susimian after all.

Microsoft is right....

[gmuslera]

... Linux MUST be hard to use, see how difficult will be to pronounce the name of most of their main distributions (SuSE with mixed case? Ubuntu? And now... Mandriva? even is hard to pronounce linux [sladen.org]), then installing/using them should be even harder.

Thinking that

[Anonymous Coward]

Mangina might've been a better name.

It's curable

[George Tirebuyer]

I swear I caught this once and a shot of Trobicin fixed it.

Has anyone else noticed ... ?

[Chromodromic]

That if, say, you're an English speaker unfamiliar with the "i's" long "e" sound, you'll be likely to pronounce it "Man-dreyeva", which sounds like New York slang for "Mandriver", which sounds like gay porn?

Not that there's anything wrong with that ...

Well, actually, for a product name, yes there is. That's awful. God. A name only an engineer could love.

Re:Has anyone else noticed ... ?

[Hooded One]

Any way you pronounce it, they've pretty much chosen the gayest name possible. I believe my boyfriend would concur. ;)

In other news...

[Anonymous Coward]

RedHat and Astaro Security Linux [astaro.com] have merged to become Red Ass Linux

All welcome our Red Ass overlords!

Re:In other news...

[Yankel]

RedHat and Astaro Security Linux have merged to become Red Ass Linux

I thought they were going with AssHat Linux.

Avirdnam

[Swamii]

You know that when your company's sounds better pronounced backwards, you've picked a lousy name.

A Weird Name (was Re:Avirdnam)

[manastungare]

Now, ain't that "a weird name" really ...

interesting -- deb/rpm based

[dalutong]

Mandriva is now merged with conectiva, which funds ubuntu. is this a novell novell/suse/ximian thing?

is the difference in supporting distros with different packaging systems really that minimal?

Woah

[Skynet]

For a second I thought it said "Mangina."

They're just trying to filter out the females...

[0siris]

I can imagine it now.

Mandriva? Man driva? Woman can drive just as well as men! Sexist company, I'll not be using their distro!

I hate to say it...

[RichDice]

I hate to say it, but I have heard ass that sounds better than this. *sigh*

Cheers,
Richard

Damn

[jb.hl.com]

I was banking on Mandows.

One thing's for sure...

[calethix]

I don't think they'll have any long-winding trademark lawsuits over Mandriva.

At the risk of redundancy...

[CDarklock]

...what a stupid name.

"Condrake" would have been easy to pronounce. Unfortunately, it has the word "Con" in it, which doesn't sound like a good thing to buy.

Why didn't they use something completely new like "Foxglove"? It's herbal and has earthy, pagan overtones like Mandrake. It's also got some interesting connotations about being a comfortable covering for Firefox.

I *like* Foxglove. Somebody should start a Foxglove Linux project. I can immediately picture the logo, the website, and a half dozen decent marketing campaigns. You could talk about it being "foxy", make a pun on the Dr. Seuss classic "Fox in Socks", make "fox guarding the henhouse" references, say it "fits like a glove", run a "Poison your PC" campaign, or (my personal favorite) call it "digital digitalis". It's a *damn* fine name for a Linux distro.

Too bad nobody ever listens to me. ;)

Hearst lawsuit

[bcrowell]

More info about the Hearst lawsuit here [desktoplinux.com]. Wow, looks to me like a pretty clear case where a big, powerful corporation is using a lawsuit that's utterly without merit in order to screw a small, weak corporation.

BTW, mandrake is also a natural laxative.

Re:Hearst lawsuit

[schon]

mandrake is also a natural laxative.

Maybe, but it's a bitch swallowing all eight CDs.

It's not April 1st, I know

[gsasha]

But none of the jokes back then was nearly as funny as this one ;)

Mandriva

[PeDRoRist]

Womanshouta

Condrake would've been better

[I_Human]

or Drakecon, or something - Mandriva sounds like a cartoon witch harassing Bugs Bunny.

No no no!

[erroneus]

That doesn't roll off the tongue.

MANDIVA! Now that's a better name... or is it?

Now we know why Mandrake has seemed so lost...

[adrenaline_junky]

like any Mandriva, they won't stop to ask for directions.

(sorry)

Pronounciation

[hyfe]

Sometimes, tt's fun to notice how english centric slashdot is. Given how many Europeans without english as native language there are here, it is kinda surprising at times.

Mandriva; good pronounication in the scandivian languages, spanish, german, french and spanish.

Mandrake; good pronounication in english. >p> Majority of posters complain about pronounication :)

Re:Names

[baudilus]

A rose by any other name......

.....could still not be as stupid sounding as "Mandriva."

Well At Least

[Greyfox]

It wasn't Mangina. Though that's always an option if they hit the skids and are really hard up for a bit'o cash...

Re:Well At Least

[AceCaseOR]

The only problem with that though, is that it becomes vaguely obsene if you add a letter, sort of like "Puck-Man" (though that was a matter of changing a letter).

Re:I'm glad they didn't go with the runners up

[tomhudson]

They should have gone with Lesbian GNU/Linux [lesbian.mine.nu].

Check out some of the open-source lesbian linux sex instructions [collegesexadvice.com]

... and patching the kernel, etc [collegesexadvice.com]

Re:Changing name over and over..

[Wudbaer]

Oh, that's nothing. I have a really impressing resume with work experience at four different biotech companies - just that they always were one and the same that kept changing names for some stupid reasons. So it's not just open source.

Re:Mandriva?

[nickos]

It should have been "Mandrake is dead, long live Mandriva!" rather than "Mandrake is dead, long life to Mandriva!". It's a reference to the phrase "The king is dead, long live the king" [everything2.com]

No, it's a recursive acronym

[marciot]

> Distro Renamed to Irritate Various Americans

Good idea, but you got it slightly wrong. It's a recursive acronym:

Driva Really Irrates Various Americans.

-- Marcio