Project Rebrand?

English Open Chat
83

If the name is to be changed, it should probably:

  • have a wide audience appeal
  • be relatively short so as to be easily combined with Tumbleweed, Leap, Aeon, …
  • be reasonably catchy or easy to remember
  • relate back to Open or SUSE or a chameleon is some direct or indirect way

Chameleon has quite a few syllables, perhaps too many?

geekOS might be narrowing the audience a bit.

Animals that change color that could be the basis for a catchy short name?

  • OctoOS Tumbleweed,
  • OpenOcto Leap,
  • NewtOS Aeon,
  • Newt Kalpa.

Perhaps words related to changing color or color?

  • OpalliOS Tumbleweed (from the greek opallios)
  • OpenAura Leap

Anything that could start with Open or be related to it. Unfortunately OpenOS and OpenLinux are in use.

Maybe acronyms:

  • OSOS Tumbleweed (Open Source OS)

  • O2 Tumbleweed (Open OS).

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84

@mchnz I think subtle associations to SUSE and gecko will make no sense outside very few initiated. More direct association that would make sense to a wider group but will be unacceptable to the copyright owners. I agree with the other points, plus it should work on a range of languages.

Separately, Open(SUSE) is thinking how to manage Leap, TW, etc. How independent, how to share available resources between them and how to provide the more technical input currently provided by SUSE.
If they go they choose fairly independent arrangement, then different OS names as suggested make sense. If they remain under the same group then they should have a common OS name.
Quite a set of choices for the Members to agree and negotiate with SUSE!

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85

I think renaming an entire project with almost 20 years of history will severely damage its image. Anything that sounds close to Geeko or OpenSUSE will sound like a knockoff, while a completely different name would throw all of that built up branding out of the window.

We really are at crossroads here.

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87

I wonder why noone is coming to the obvious conclusion?

You already have a name that is suitable > Leap!

It has been around for a long time, so it should retain at least a little “brand recognition” instead of loosing it all. And you can keep the new lizard logo without a problem.
Many people seem to hang themselves on the point of the cute mascot and I totally get it. But trying to find a name that has any direct relation to it is IMHO a fool’s errand and will only lead to some ridiculous not at all trust inspiring stuff like Geeko something (shudder) and the likes.

And when you’re at it, rename/reposition all offerings!

Current Leap becomes Leap Server/LTS
It isn’t really suited for the average desktop user anyway with its older kernel/packages und rather a good choice for setting up servers, with an easy upgrade path to SLES, which it is based on, AFAIK

Tumbleweed would be Leap Rolling
Cutting/bleeding edge for the people who actually know what they are doing! Let me tell you being on TW while KDE pushes out the new Plasma version, is not really that much fun for a novice linux user.

Slowroll would be Leap Desktop
This should be the center piece of the whole thing, with all attention and as much polish as possible, pushed to the regular desktop user. The flagship for lack of a better word. And when you’re at it loosen up a bit! An enterprise grade firewall with really secure standard settings might be a nice idea, but for a new linux user who just jumped ship from windows, who can’t even setup his printer without reading online guides, is a potential new user you just lost… just to give an example. Under the hood the system is good and stable, it’s just not really inviting and welcoming in its current form. And you need new users, as many as you can get your grubby little hands on. Because with mass comes recognition and this makes it much easier to recruit new developers/maintainers to the project, which you are in dire need of.

Aeon, Kalpa etc could either be Leap insert flavor name or just their own thing, like fedora does it with all the silverblue derivatives

Just my 2 cents. I see myself out before the mob comes to lynch me…

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88

I’m not sure about the potential damage. It’s not like it’s at the level of awareness of a major brand, except to the relatively small Linux community (who would understand the situation). A rebrand event might actually create some publicity. If a name like Lenovo can prosper, it gives hope for the silliest of renamings.

I’m not arguing in favour of a change, but if the issue is eventually forced, then I don’t think the sky will fall (but it’s probably true that a poor choice of name might not help).

89

I would like to interject and express that Leap is actually pretty good choice for desktop users. Slowroll (and Tumbleweed by extension) regularly receive major updates, while Leap receives them only once a year. The packages are so stable that you don’t need a separate BTRFS partition to daily drive Leap.
Tumbleweed is also such a recognizable name by now that abandoning it just wouldn’t make sense.

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90

Sorry I posted this in a wrong thread.

The new management is obviously not capitalizing on whatever theyre doing with SUSE as a product and they feel openSUSE has an edge over them because its free and it works anyway, unlike RedHat who simply sells whatever services they have while Fedora is the independent freebie they support.

That edge openSUSE got has nothing to do with openSUSE, free community distributions will always be attractive whatever their name or patron, and you cant blame your freebie for failing to sell your premium one.

Unlike Canonical, you cant just break your free community system and sell only your premium one, because then no one will take your premium one seriously if the public face of your freebie is broken.

OpenSUSE cant be sold, because it is free community. It can be rebranded, but then the public will turn to the new free brand and hardly know about the premium one. Right now SUSE should take the best of openSUSE and repackage and sell it as a premium product with full support and less breakups without ever sabotaging openSUSE, because then SUSE loses too.

But if openSUSE gets another name you might as well expect it to be completely separate from your main product, it might as well gain a new life as a separate entity and then youll have double the effort to sell your premium one.

Or it might die or lose visibility and public renown, and then your premium one also dies or you lose the free publicity. Either way if you dont know how to sell SUSE, no matter what you do you wont sell it.

New managements are so stupid sometimes. Just remember, you may kill openSUSE with your decision, but then SUSE will take a huge, huge damage too, PR wise too.

The public arent stupid, if I want something supported and professional I wont take the free alternative, unless youre so stupid at selling it that your freebie sells better on its own even with its bugs and difficulty to configure and use -openSUSE is not meant for companies!-.

The chameleon brand, yes the abstract brand, likes openSUSE, take that away and you take its soul, so SUSE brand will become depressed and will find it difficult to sell itself.

This only shows that you guys want to boost sales of premium product not by improving marketing or improving your product, but by bullying the freebie that relies on you and whose community also supports the weight of your product!

As an user I have so many alternatives, if I dont choose SUSE over openSUSE its because: 1.Im not a company who needs professional stuff. 2.Youve done little to let the average user like me know the benefits of SUSE over openSUSE, and yes, they compete with each other, dont you know defunct Novells philosophy of coopetition?

Cooperation and competition, it helps products grow, so naturally they have to compete, one is free the other is paid for and should get all the money! and if openSUSE wins the competition against the professional and paid and company sponsored product with the big money then you dont blame openSUSE but your own lack of expertise in making the premium product stand out, promoting it and selling it. And no, sabotaging it like Canonical does Ubuntu wont help.

Ask yourselves, what are you selling? Why is it not selling? Trust me, RedHat doesnt worry about Fedora selling better than their Enterprise product, they just go and sell it! or Canonical about Linux Mint or Debian, they just break Ubuntu and then wonder why they dont see profits with their premium products.

Dont kill openSUSE brand UNLESS and only UNLESS you have a better idea for it already in mind. And I dont mean better as in “this might be a good rename, lets try it”, but an idea everyone approves immediately.

Otherwise youre poking in the dark and may end up shooting your own foot with stupid decisions. How pathetic would it be that Microsoft rebranded Windows Home Edition for retail because Windows Enterprise isnt selling, or Red Hat wanted to keep Fedora at bay because theyre not selling their server solutions?

With openSUSE its different, it was born with the SUSE brand and the community support and the sponsorship of a company. You try to keep openSUSE away from SUSE, it all starts with a rebrand, and if it doesnt work, then things go downhill for it and for your product and for PR. And without the community’s approval, SUSE wont fly on its own, but need more money to support it.

Right now the openSUSE community helps SUSE somehow. You dont stay away from the community, but sell your product aggressively like its the best thing out there. Now, why is SUSE the best thing out there? What gives it an edge over community freebies? Better yet, what should you do to make it stand out? Dont shoot your foot SUSE, use your head.

I mean you wanna see how threatening a rebrand of openSUSE can be to SUSE? Change openSUSE to SUSY Linux, now it’s real competition.

Keep it as openSUSE and remember: coopetition, not sabotage. Work on SUSE’s marketing and unique features, dont harass your community, dont harass openSUSE.

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91

Run Leap as a desktop? Sure you can do that, for some people this may even be perfect or enough. BTW I think everyone should, especially new people even intermediates, use BTRFS on opensuse, because if you don’t know what you’re really doing in the first place, or start learning by doing, trying out all kinds of crap, the great integration of BTRFS and snapshots is a god send, and really a major selling point for opensuse. I know what I’m talking about in this regard. Not everyone is as linux savvy as some, maybe most users on this forum.^^

You have to try to see it from the perspective of a new user, a casual, most likely someone who likes to game in their spare time, therefor has more recent hardware, etc. People like this, I would guess, want a system that is simultaneously as up to date and stable as possible. Slowroll as a Leap Desktop Edition IMHO fits this description best. Really new users come most likely from the windows camp, because of all the privacy BS that is going on in Remdmond, or the mac camp, because people had enough of paying the apple tax through their noses. Most people that already use other distros sadly seem to have a rather negative or meh, whatever view of opensuse, exception maybe linux cast who put out another endorsement video the other day, but he is one in how many? I don’t know. Fact is that every other video regarding opensuse has the same critique points, and I can see why. The whole line up seems to be more or less in maintenance mode. Who can blame the devs & maintainers if there are as few, as I am led to believe by some sources here on the forum or mailinglists. Time to pool resources, look for the most promising goal and than pursue it ferociously! Grow the community, more users means more publicity and in turn more people who like to participate and contribute. Hell, I would love to do it myself, but I can’t. I’m in no way computer illiterate, but I can’t really programm anything and the only maintenance I’m capable of is trying to keep my about to fail body barely working… essentially I’m the old man yelling at clouds at this point. I remember buying the Suse boxed versions a quarter of a century ago. I think I still have the install CDs in some boxes somewhere…

BTW if your heart hangs on the Tumbleweed name > Leap Tumbleweed, the cutting edge, as fast as Arch but more stable and with a failsafe out of the box! There, fixed it for you.^^

92

My best guess is they know all this very well and there is method to the madness.
Tumbleweed is AFAIK know upstream for SLES, the test bed so to say. If they’re pushing in the direction of everything immutable, containerized, cloudbased, ALP etc I’m not sure how much they need this testing ground any more, or if they could soon be able to do the whole upstream for their enterprise offerings inhouse without the openSuse community effort. If it would come to this, the partial sharing of a trademarked name could actually become a hinderance or nuisance for them. May be they’re planning for this. Slowly cut ties, nothing to abrupt, who wants bad press after all? But bit by bit, constant dripping wears away the stone. Maybe this is the beginning of the end for the generous community support provided by SUSE up to this point. Maybe I’m just a delusional old man yelling at clouds…

93

I hate where this is going. I used to love openSUSE, I had high hopes and faith in openSUSE. I even attempted to have a perfectly usable desktop on openSUSE. Leap was too slow to bring new software. Rolling releases have bugs but its the closest to something stable with the latest software. I was planning on reinstalling openSUSE. Tumbleweed. And now? Turns out as a registered brand SUSE’s new management wants to strip openSUSE of its iconic name, essence, logos, because it turns out openSUSE was never really an independent entity. I hate rebrandings because they result in different stuff, like forks or tributes and rarely for the better, and I cant see it turning into something better than the green or green blue chameleon thing it was, so I can foresee it already losing its brand and turning into some newer, different distro. Even installing openSUSE right now doesnt feel like something stable or guaranteed to last with the threat of losing all its attributes via parent company. You wont do anything better than that SUSE, your attitude is wicked, doomed to fail. Only a bad copy can ensue. And the worst thing is that theres no better distro on the horizon to replace it. No, SUSE Linux Enterprise wont replace the void of openSUSE. The chameleon, the green design, the history of it. You trashed it all by threatening to strip it away. It was the only professional looking distro out there and you just killed it with your threats. Maybe not yet, but eventually. It’s doomed. The decision is made. Arch is too hard. Ubuntu is too crappy now, killed by Canonical. Fedora is good as of now but its future is also gloomy, Red Hat is taking a path of ill decisions that threaten its future and people are stepping out. Debian is too outdated with its software. Linux Mint feels too simplistic. Slackware rarely gets maintained and is too slow, too few people. CentOS is also being killed by RedHat. The newer distros are maybe too new for their own good. You had it with openSUSE Tumbleweed but youll end up killing it too. The future of Linux is bleak unless something better arises. You killed openSUSE now. And I had hopes for it.

94

Please stay with the facts. You are making up a story. SUSE is not threatening openSUSE at all. Nobody is killing openSUSE and its distributions. Maybe you should start from the beginning and read what this topic is about.

And for the sake of readability, it would be good when you use some formatting like paragraphs. It is hard to read your massive text blobs…

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95

Saw Furcifer, too, but was a bit worried about similarity to other the other evil word ending with “cifer”.
That’s why I was suggesting Calumma, instead, if we want to stick to a chameleon species.

96

Generally, I can accept the demand from SUSE, but I am constantly asking myself: what’s then in for me?
Do we have more lose dependencies from SUSE?
Can we move forward w/o the sync burden with SUSE?
Can we then finally include multimedia codecs by default w/o requiring packman?
Will we be free from SUSE?

But I guess the answers will all be “no”, right?

97

This will be a burden eventually. It will feel as such. It’s doomed.

98

I don’t want to go off topic, but I think it is because of the association of an old distro. For example, we used to have our programming classes in secondary school on computers that ran openSUSE (or SUSE, idk – didn’t matter to me at the time).
So when I finally wanted to get away from Windows, I didn’t actually consider openSUSE, as I had a connotation of it being old and dusty – like, you wouldn’t consider using Windows XP today. I had no idea, that it is actually very modern and has the best features of the current linux world.

So maybe a rebranding could actually benefit this community.

I know that the individual projects won’t get a rebranding, but I think it would be good to have an overarching theme for everything.
So the real question is what could be a word, or attribute, or anything, that could tie all of the distros together. (Leap, Tumbleweed, Slowroll, Aeon, Kalpa – sry if I missed some)

Also, we shouldn’t forget that we can also use acronyms again. So just for fun I asked my local chat bot and it came up with Collaborative Open Source Environment (COSE)

99

Partner, an agent of SUSE just gave a wall of arguments with motivated reasoning on why openSUSE needs to be stripped of its branding.

It is crystal clear. The men in charge dont want another SUSE distro than their own. Community will end up with a clone. Change the brand, name, logo and youre not in the same system anymore. Whatever you do is not part of SUSE or the openSUSE project anymore.

You know how a version change makes everything different that there have to be forks to bring back the feel. Change the brand and the new brand inspires new ideas, different essence and suddenly its not the same. To begin with, it will not be openSUSE anymore.

Is OpenOffice.org the same project as StarOffice? Or as Apache OpenOffice? It’s dead now. And I hope Im right because I dont wanna install a system whose essence is not its own, or that could be changed any minute by an executive, and lose official branding, sponsorship or whatever. Thats the threat. Its not like they threaten to do it, but the fact they may do it any minute if they please is a threat to the identity of openSUSE. And that is how they already killed it, like RedHat is doing Fedora and CentOS, or Canonical doesnt even care to provide a functioning Ubuntu.

It’s a tendency, pal.

100

You definitely watched another presentation than the one from the oSC 2024. There is no threat. There is no deadline. There is no force.

It is a chance!

  • a chance and opportunity to step out of the shadow of SUSE
  • a chance to shape an own brand
  • the community can decide where the sucessor of openSUSE is steering and is more independent from SUSE

WE are the community! WE make openSUSE and its potential sucessor happen! WE shape our future!

Atm it is a mindgame. No need to jump to conclusion before anything started.
And for that we don’t need ppl wich don’t trust in the project and don’t believe in it and say its doomed before the transformation process even startet!

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101

I fully agree! The reason to use an openSuse Distro, is the quality of it.
For sure I will stay, whatever name it will get at the end.

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102

I understand your sentiment, but BTRFS is far from ideal. For instance, if you have less than 10% percent of free space, you can experience file corruption. Or if you dedicate BTRFS only to root, you’ll have a little more than half of your hard drive space to work with. The reason I value OpenSUSE is because it offers XFS support out of the box, something which most distros lack.

103

@asdhio did you have a cite for this statement, or more anecdotal? I run btrfs on / (60GB only and using 55%) with a few partitions allocated to xfs. I don’t use snapper, this system has been running for almost 4 years on Tumbleweed now without issues… My three RPi3’s run btrfs on on 16MB SD cards, they have been running for over 5 years without issues.