Name - Naming Convention

For Wikipedia's own naming conventions see Wikipedia:Article titles

A naming convention is an attempt to systematize names in a field so they unambiguously convey similar information in a similar manner.

Several major naming conventions include:

• In astronomy, planetary nomenclature
• In classics, Roman naming conventions
• In computer programming, identifier naming conventions
• In computer networking, computer naming schemes
• In the sciences, systematic names for a variety of things

Naming conventions are useful in many aspects of everyday life, enabling the casual user to understand larger structures.

Street names within a city may follow a naming convention; some examples include:

• In Manhattan, roads that cross the island from east to west are called "Streets". Those that run the length of the island (North-South) are called "Avenues". Most of Manhattan's streets and avenues are numbered, with "1st Street" being near the southern end of the island, and "219th Street" being near the northern end, while "1st Avenue" is near the eastern edge of the island and "12th Avenue" near the western edge.
• In Ontario, numbered concession roads are East-West whereas "lines" are North-South routes.
• In San Francisco at least three series of parallel streets are alphabetically named, e.g. Irving, Judah, Kirkham, Lawton, Moraga, Noriega, Ortega, Pacheco, Quintara, Rivera, Santiago, Taraval, Ulloa, Vicente, Wawona.
• The same tendency is seen in the Back Bay neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, where Arlington Street is followed by roads to the west running parallel to it and named Berkeley, Clarendon, Dartmouth, Exeter, Fairfield, Gloucester, and Hereford.
• In Washington, DC, East Capitol Street runs east-west through the Capitol. East-west streets moving away from Capitol Street toward both the south (toward the Potomac River) and the north are lettered A, B, C,..., omitting J to avoid confusion on street signs and addresses, but after these are exhausted to the north, the streets are named with simple words in alphabetical order, omitting a few letters such as "x". The first cycle of names consists all of one-syllable words; then followed by a cycle of two-syllable words; then followed by a cycle of three-syllable words, and before these are exhausted, Maryland is reached. (Washington has north-south streets that are numbered, increasing to either side of North Capitol which likewise runs through the Capitol.) Suffixes (NE, SW, etc.) are used to distinguish between (up to four) duplicate addresses. For example 140 D Street SW, to indicate the 140 D Street location southwest of the Capitol
• In Montgomery, Alabama, the old major avenues are named for the Presidents of the United States, in their order of entering office, omitting John Quincy Adams. Hence, these streets are Washington Ave., Adams Ave., Jefferson Ave., Madison Ave., Monroe Ave., Jackson Ave., but not much farther than that. This was just the old plan from a long time ago, and it was eventually dropped. For example, there is not a Buchanan Ave., a Lincoln Ave., or a Johnson Ave.
• In Brampton, Ontario, different sections of town all have streets starting with the same letter and the alphabetical order reflects chronology.
• In Phoenix, Arizona, roads east of Central Avenue are termed streets while those west are avenues. A similar system applies in Nashville, Tennessee, but only to the numbered avenues and streets, west and east of the Cumberland River respectively, all of which run roughly north-south.

Large corporate, university, or government campuses may follow a naming convention for rooms within the buildings to help orient tenants and visitors. Otherwise, rooms may be numbered in some kind of a rational scheme.

Parents may follow a naming convention when selecting names for their children. Some have chosen alphabetical names by birth order. In some East Asian cultures, it is common for one syllable in a two syllable given name to be a generation name which is the same for immediate siblings. In many cultures it is common for the son to be named after the father or a grandfather. In certain African cultures, such as in Cameroon, the eldest son gets the family name for his given name, also, giving names such as "Thomas Thomas" (but the names are not European names like this one).

In other cultures, the name may include the place of residence, or the place of birth. The Roman naming convention denotes social rank.

Products may follow a naming convention. Automobiles typically have a binomial name, a "make" (manufacturer) and a "model", in addition to a model year, such as a 2007 Chevrolet Corvette. Sometimes there is a name for the car's "decoration level" or "trim line" as well: e.g., Cadillac Escalade EXT Platinum, after the precious metal. Computers often have increasing numbers in their names to signify the next generation.

Courses at schools typically follow a naming convention: an abbreviation for the subject area and then a number ordered by increasing level of difficulty.

Many numbers (e.g. bank accounts, government IDs, credit cards, etc.) are not random but have an internal structure and convention. Virtually all organizations that assign names or numbers will follow some convention in generating these identifiers. Airline flight numbers, space shuttle flight numbers, even phone numbers all have an internal convention.