Redmine

I really must admit i don't like that name at all. I LOVE the app. But the name sounds explosive and destructive and a bit evil. Conjures images of mines, blood, war, nazis, communism, and general destruction for me every time i think about it. Even mining as an activity is dark, scary, dirty, and full of explosions and destruction.

We're working on a theme right now and are planning on hiding the name from our clients all together.

What about rebranding this application all together? We might not even loose the SEO if the new brand is SEO friendly.

My sense is that people should feel the following when they use this system:

• Secure / Safe
• Happy / Inspired
• Organized
• Calm
• Confident

The name "Redmine" doesn't hit me for any of those terms. If you look at things like basecamp or other supremely popular systems, they are friendly, and all the other stuff i listed.

I mean, just think of the term basecamp.... A base = foundation. Camp = moving and inspiration of what lies in the next day.

Redmine is also client facing, developer facing, and we're trying to make it also designer facing. Being flexible, it has to work for people who are left brained and right brained alike.

In the future, I imagine this app could either become hugely popular, or a flash in the pan. Our team has been investing a lot in this app and it seems to me that changing the brand is ESSENTIAL to elevating this app.

I'd like to propose that we brainstorm on some alternative names and rebrand this app before it becomes any more entrenched.

As long as i'm moving my other comments over, i might as well include these as well.

• I'd love to have a panel on this subject at Redmine Camp
• These are the things we've been thinking about as we design our new theme

I strongly disagree about the name. Redmine is a great name for a Ruby application.

I totally agree with peter.

Markus, what makes you like it? I vibe with what you are saying about the tie to the red of the RoR community, but frankly most users are not using it for the code, they are using it to help them manage projects.

I keep having clients look at me funny when I use the name.

Yes, Red = Ruby...
I just find it's a funny name and since I live in a non-English country people have no problem with the name. I guess that's different in English-speaking country...

There's nothing inherently wrong with the name Redmine and, of all the people I've introduced to it, no one's said "Gee, that name reminds me of Auschwitz".

The name sounds explosive and destructive and a bit evil. Conjures images of mines, blood, war, nazis, communism, and general destruction for me every time i think about it. Even mining as an activity is dark, scary, dirty, and full of explosions and destruction.

And if you count up the number of characters in "Jean-Philippe" you get 13. Oooh! 13's an unlucky number. /sarcasm

Is the name Redmine seriously a concern?

<Eric's opinion>
The name Redmine doesn't come with a lot of great images but I don't think of any bad images either. The big problem with changing a name is it causes a ton of confusion for the community. Instead of a name change, what about branding the term "Redmine" with images of good things?
</Eric's opinion>

If we want to continue a discussion about renaming Redmine, lets post some alternatives and discuss them. That would be a more constructive discussion than the faults with the name "Redmine".

Eric

I couldn't agree with eric more. Though I think Peter may have stated his case with too much verve, he brings an interesting point up for discussion.

Brad, your use of sarcasm was eloquent. I do not mean any disrespect when I ask if all of your clients have truly never exhibited any awkwardness at the name. I have received enough odd looks that I am just surprised. Though I will admit a bunch of our clients have come to call it redvine stating they like that better (maybe it is those fond childhood movie theatre memories?).

So 3 questions:

1) what are the goals of the redmine community?

2) if the community was to go through a branding exercise, what is involved?

3) what are the pro / cons of changing the name

I figure the answer to 1 will really enable us to have an intelligent discussion about 2 & 3.

My take on the questions above:

1) I'd break this into the goal of the app and the goal of the community:

App: in my head I think of the app as a way to "Run projects the way I work." My goal is always to find ways to make the app as much a part of the natural workflow of a developer or designer as can possible happen. I will also add that it helps me as an owner and project manager stay on track, on budget, on time - and stay profitable so that I can pay my mortgage.

We reviewed close to 30 different PM systems and chose redmine because it was an extensible and easily customizable community driven project management application. To put it in simple terms, the foundation was solid and it was reasonably straight forward to grow the app as our company continues to grow.

Community: I am not sure but can't wait to hear people's thoughts. Do we want to have this become a main stream app? Do we want to stay small? Do we want this app to stay available basically only to developers (like wordpress was before they built their 1-click install)? What is our ideal user: a small open source team, a software services firm, a single person, a massive product lifecycle? Do we want to invite designers / themers to play in our sandbox and make theme creation simple?

2) Brand

Identity: Logo, Name, Colors, Tagline, Emotional tone
Marketing: .org site, blog, seo, contribution and referral links ...
PR: re-education and dissemination of new brand

name approaches (if we go this way):

name that explains what the app does
name that evokes an ideal emotion
name that is memorable

I will think of actual names and post them as they come to mind. I need to head to bed now.

3) Pro Vs Con

I'll put my 2c on this in the morning as well.

and some personal thoughts on nomenclature:

Markus, it never occurred to me that people would hear the sound but not the meaning (which makes perfect sense). while this is probably dead obvious, just for the international folks, I'll break down the name a touch from a semantics perspective:

"Red" is pretty clear - it is often the color of intensity (in both good and bad ways). Personally I have no beef with the red part, just its combination with the word mine. Active collab has done an amazing job using the color red in its branding. I'll imply that active collab immediatly lets you know the purpose of the app, which I find one interesting approach.

The issue at hand is that there are really three meaning to mine:

Mine = a possesive term indicating it belongs to you (which when merged with red has no higher meaning that I can think of - am I missing it? Also - isn't this app about collaboration and team, not necessarily me. But then again, in the end, it always does come back to the individual experience).

Mine - to dig into the soil and extract resources such as ore, salt and stone (which is an interesting analogy when consider a data management system, but does not evoke the effective execution of a project and coordination of resources to me, just the extraction of valuable information).

Mine - an explosive device used in warfare that causes great destruction when weight is applied to its surface (I associate this negatively simple because of the word, but mixed with red it makes it more vivid).

I think the problem I am struggling with is that when I head "red-mine", I often find myself thinking of the third item. Perhaps I am simply a morbid human being and this is not a common issue for other native english speakers.

Are there an relevant on positive associations that are in line with the goals of the app that we can derive from the words red and mine as a basis for a rebrand without loosing the name?

I had a long post in mind, but after some thought I guess it boils down to:

1. Since redmine is not a "for sale" product (at least not directly) how important is the name in terms of adoption?
2. How many pepole (clients) would turn a product down on name basis alone?
3. Since it's easy to re-brand the product on per-install basis, does the name really matter that much?

I would argue that feature set and constant development and evolution of the product are more important to long term survival of the project than name alone. It's evident that redmine is getting more and more recognition as a "kick-ass" product despite the "awkward" name.

And finally, yes, you can find relative positive associations with the name redmine. If you look at mines (the dig in the earth kind) they are the source of invaluable resources and to be effective and "safe" require a lot collaboration and teamwork.

Combining the name redmine with a powerful visual identity and an awesome tagline and I believe you have enough for a "kick-ass" open source project. If you wish to market a service to "end users" like basecamp does, that's a different beast, but AFAIK that's not the intention (even so, you could always market under different name and be based on the "open-source" redmine project).

A very good example of such combination (IMHO) is Martin Herr's logo proposal in this thread , and just to illustrate how powerful visual identity is in connecting words with meaning, I never thought about mines (the exploding kind) in association with redmine, until i saw a logo proposal with a mine in it (in the above mentioned thread).

It's late in my timezone, so I hope the things I wrote make sense, thoughts seem to be fading fast ...

Here, here to Mitja's post.

Oh, and if it means anything, I really like the icon of the ore cart with the ruby in it. I think that should be the logo. Brands are what you make of it, how else would you explain "Dick's Sporting Goods" being a hugely successful sporting goods chain, or everyone in the 80's running around wearing a "fanny pack".

Really, seriously, did no one respond to my post about RailsConf09? Is no one going?

It's getting late here but I'll try to chime in on this a bit

Shane Pearlman wrote:

1) what are the goals of the redmine community?

Application: provide a flexible platform to help manage a group of people working collaboratively. Dare I say it? A Project Framework.

Community: I'm happy with it being a niche application but I don't have any problems with it growing. We already have a strong group of people using Redmine now and I've seeing it get a lot more good press lately.

I have a two core users in mind, though I'd welcome anyone else:

• Small software development shops - Smaller software companies that have outgrown basic tools like email and need some centralization.
• Open source developers - Many open source developers run several small projects and Redmine makes it trivial to manage them in one place.

I'd like to throw this back at others in the community, who do you think is Redmine's target users?

Do we want to invite designers / themers to play in our sandbox and make theme creation simple?

A resounding yes. I'm been actively talking Redmine up to non-developers to get some help improving the other parts of the system. Now that the plugin system is maturing, I think it's time to really shore up the theme system.

2) if the community was to go through a branding exercise, what is involved?

Identity: Logo, Name, Colors, Tagline, Emotional tone

Yes.

Marketing: .org site, blog, seo, contribution and referral links ...

Not sure about the .org site, since this is Redmine.org here. I'm trying to keep quiet about the blog until later this month ;). I've started on the contribution side but I need help building it up and refining it. Not sure what referral links would be.

PR: re-education and dissemination of new brand

Yes, I'm doing some unorganized grass-roots stuff right now but something a bit more organized would be good.

3) what are the pro / cons of changing the name

I'm said my piece on it above. I haven't seen it to be a disadvantage with anyone I've talked to yet.

Are there an relevant on positive associations that are in line with the goals of the app that we can derive from the words red and mine as a basis for a rebrand without loosing the name?

The images I got from it was "Ruby" (Red) and mining, like looking for gems in the rough. There's a nice link there with the fact that Ruby's are a gem. I never thought about an explovie mine until Peter mentioned it.

Eric

Eric Davis wrote:

The images I got from it was "Ruby" (Red) and mining, like looking for gems in the rough. There's a nice link there with the fact that Ruby's are a gem. I never thought about an explovie mine until Peter mentioned it.

Same here, in fact I didn't even understand what he meant first...

I'll always be surprised by marketing people, I don't think I know anyone that could think something bad about the name "Redmine".

The second thing that surprises me is speaking of "branding" for an open source project.
Guys we really don't live in the same world, mine is one where not everything has to be sold :)

IMHO, which seems to be shared, this name is perfectly chosen for what it is.

Markus, Eric and Damien, I am glad that you only saw the name from one particular perspective. Perhaps with the right branding we can communicate that vision clearly to the world of people using Redmine who happen not to be RoR coders. Damien your "marketing people" comment makes it quite clear that you only envision this project as being for RoR coders by RoR coders, which may be fine but perhaps too limited if we are using Eric's target audience.

As I asked above, what is your vision for redmine? It is one thing to say, I think it is fine and I am going to sit here and do nothing. Or perhaps you could speak up and join the effort to shape the future of open source project? Some open source projects are built for small communities, others - take wordpress for example - were built for a small community at first and then open their doors strategically (employing the power of a proper branding strategy among other things) and exploded onto the main stream.

Do we want to be main stream? Personally I think that would be wonderful. Do you think bloggers care that wordpress is build on php? Not in the slightest. If Redmine is to be the project framework that Eric mentions above, do you think the average project manager cares that redmine is built on RoR? Probably not. It is not a bad thing or a good thing, just something we need to consider.

I want to shift this dialog from one of just "do we rename" to what is our community vision for the future or redmine and let that decide what makes sense.

Should I move this dialog to a new thread?

Interesting discussion here. I've used Redmine no my own since I first encountered in when working with Shane and Peter. I really like the system, but it was a bear and a half to set up on my own.

I'm a developer with extensive experience in languages with C-like syntax, but not ruby background. I think Redmine is great and could be really useful to non-technical people outside of the RoR community if it was easier to set up and looked a bit more like the comps linked to above (regarding S&P's new Redmine theme).

I'm not sure if the name Redmine needs to be changed, as I don't really get evil images in my head when I hear the name, but if the development team wants to see some type of adoption among a wider range of users then some work needs to be done. If you want people to use something you've developed, you need to sell it at least a little bit, and that usually comes in the form of a branding or marketing push. After a push like that, you should be able to ensure that the name conjures up the feeling and meanings that you want and not "Nazis" as Peter said.

Thats interesting. Out of curiosity - as a non RoR developer. What kind of install / support would have made adoption simpler? What got in your way?

Hi Shane

Damien your "marketing people" comment makes it quite clear that you only envision this project as being for RoR coders by RoR coders, which may be fine but perhaps too limited if we are using Eric's target audience.

I'm sorry but you're wrong as I'm not a RoR coder :)
In fact, I use Redmine to manage my team and the associated projects at work (those projects are done in many languages like C,C++,PHP,...).

As I asked above, what is your vision for redmine? It is one thing to say, I think it is fine and I am going to sit here and do nothing. Or perhaps you could speak up and join the effort to shape the future of open source project? Some open source projects are built for small communities, others - take wordpress for example - were built for a small community at first and then open their doors strategically (employing the power of a proper branding strategy among other things) and exploded onto the main stream.

Well I think you do not take the problem correctly. It's not the fact that your project is made for the masses that it will be supported by masses.
The main idea behind an opensource project is mainly what is needed by the developers and the fun they put in making it. I barely never seen branding strategy for such a project without a company behind.

Do we want to be main stream? Personally I think that would be wonderful. Do you think bloggers care that wordpress is build on php? Not in the slightest. If Redmine is to be the project framework that Eric mentions above, do you think the average project manager cares that redmine is built on RoR? Probably not. It is not a bad thing or a good thing, just something we need to consider.

I don't care about what ESR mentions and you're true that almost all projects managers don't care about the technology used to build Redmine. So if we don't care about it being a RoR applications, why should we care about it's name ?
I've chosen Redmin for its features (I was using Trac before) not for its name :)

I want to shift this dialog from one of just "do we rename" to what is our community vision for the future or redmine and let that decide what makes sense.

The future of Redmine will be driven by its own contributors (mainly developers but also users).
I've been in many project where the basic rule was : "shup up and code" ;)

Should I move this dialog to a new thread?

To open a thread about politic in the Redmine community like what is done by the FSF for GNU ? :)
IMHO, that should be a waste of energy.

Damien Couderc wrote:

The main idea behind an opensource project is mainly what is needed by the developers and the fun they put in making it. I barely never seen branding strategy for such a project without a company behind.

I disagree, a lot of open source projects have marketing and branding but they generally name them other things to appease developers (I know many developers who have an immediate bad reaction to anything about marketing). Here's a few projects that I dug up in a short time.

• http://rubyonrails.org/activists
• http://rubyidentity.org/
• http://www.blender.org/blenderorg/blender-foundation/

I don't care about what ESR mentions ....

I think Shane meant me and not ESR.

The future of Redmine will be driven by its own contributors (mainly developers but also users).
I've been in many project where the basic rule was : "shup up and code" ;)

So have I but many of those projects ended up going nowhere because they didn't know where they were heading. I think all Shane is trying to do is to open up a discussion about where Redmine is heading and how we can move it that way. I know from many conversations (private and public) that this is a common concern, so this is a great conversation to have. I think it would be a good idea to restart this conversation with a more positive light in a new thread.

Eric

Eric, I second the motion to start a new thread. You down to do the honors?

Far, I entitled you all again. After my extended propinquity in the forum is not, I could not learn the open sesame to your noachian profile and started a changed one. I'm glad that I am again with you.