Bug 160155

Summary:	"kmail" is a very KDE2-ish name. Change it !
Product:	[Unmaintained] kmail	Reporter:	Aldoo <aldo-public>
Component:	general	Assignee:	kdepim bugs <kdepim-bugs>
Status:	RESOLVED INTENTIONAL
Severity:	wishlist
Priority:	NOR
Version:	unspecified
Target Milestone:	---
Platform:	unspecified
OS:	Linux
Latest Commit:		Version Fixed In:
Sentry Crash Report:

Description Aldoo 2008-03-31 13:45:57 UTC

Version:            (using KDE 4.0.2)
Installed from:    00

Well KDE4 has seen many new apps for doing something which, luckily, haven't been named "ksomething" (nepomuk, akonadi, dolphin, ... ). Also several old popular apps changed their names in that fashion: kpdf became okular, khexedit became okteta, codeine became dragon player, kboard became tagua, and so on.

Hence I would say that "kmail" really sucks as a name and sounds too much old school. Furthermore it is pronounced the same way as "caml" (for french speakers, but I believe it is almost true for english speakers and maybe other), which is confusing.

Why not try and find some cooler name for kmail KDE 4.1 ? (as kmail 4 was not ready for KDE 4.0, and still has no stable release in the KDE 4 branch, it is not too late for a name change, or is it ?)
A cool name for a cool app, doesn't that make sense ?

That said I have no precise proposition now. I will think on it and come back. But before that, can we know if the kmail devs are ok with my idea or are completely opposed to it ?

Comment 1 Thiago Macieira 2008-03-31 13:53:57 UTC

KMail is an established name. It would be a bad idea to rename a well-known application. The same goes for Konqueror.

If it gets rewritten as a new application, then it may make sense (see Mailody for a possible replacement). That's what happened with KPDF/Okular, KHexEdit/Okteta.

Codeine was never a well-known application. And it's not a "KDE2-ish" name anyways.

Comment 2 Aldoo 2008-03-31 14:12:49 UTC

Ok, there was no renaming of important apps.
I agree that could be some traumatism... but not as bad as switching from konqueror to dolphin as a default file manager, or quite equivalent to the one of replacing kpdf with okular (ok not the same app, but same usage, and kpdf does not exist anymore). I believed that in such a major event (KDE 3 -> 4) such small traumatisms were allowed.

And by the way, who still runs kmail outside of kontact nowadays ? (ok ok maybe there are some people who do so... )

Mailody is a good name, but I don't think the name alone will be enough for making me use that client instead of kmail (maybe when it will be integrated in kontact... ).

Anyway, that was just an idea that passed my mind this morning. If you think it was bad, don't act !