I am a programmer (currently SQL via SQL Server Reporting Server) as well as a novelist (working on my first novel). Oddly enough, the same issue came up in the same day in both my worlds. What’s in a name? A name must be different from other names in the domain. A name must define its owner. A name is hopefully not too similar to others as to be confused or too ambiguous to lose its meaning entirely.
In a database, the tables and column names are the items to be named. Table names such as Account and Accounts are too similar. Foreign keys that are acronyms for their referenced table such as AID and BID look great when there are very few tables. But what about when the second ‘A’ table is added such as Appliance? Are foreign keys to it also called AID or does the database designer just this foreign key to have a different naming convention or change the entire database to use a new naming standard. This trickles down into any calls using this name such as stored procedures or calling code from applications or websites. It’s a slippery slope.
In a book, the issues are a little different but also related to naming. You don’t want too many characters with names starting with the same letter, same sound, or the same syllable count. One author suggested using the phone book to find ‘realistic’ names.
So I thought I would suggest a method to uniqueness: the twenty-six characters of the alphabet. As you are creating new names (database objects or characters in a novel), keep a name map. Each new character or database object must begin with a letter of the alphabet not previously used. Track your using so that you know when the 26th character is taken. Then you can start with a new row of alphabet letter/name tracking.
This doesn’t solve every occurrence of similarly named objects, but it would make the names as they are created unique enough that you could remember them. I’m going to try it with my characters of my novel.
Interesting. In the novels I’ve worked on, I’ve kept name charts so that I can look at a glance to see if any of them are sounding too similar, but I’d never thought of the alphabet scheme to help enforce it.
Name chart? I knew there must be a term for it. Thanks.