Mandrakesoft Changes Name to Mandriva

joestar writes "Following its recent merger with Conectiva, Mandrakesoft has decided to change its name to 'Mandriva' for two reasons: "1. The recent Mandrakesoft - Conectiva merger calls for a new identity that better represents the combination of two key companies and their global presence. 2. The long-winding trademark lawsuit with Hearst Corporation has reached a point where we decided it is more reasonable for us to move forward.". Mandrake is dead, long life to Mandriva!"

Comments

Hmm

[bogie]

Mandriva? How ahh European...

In Mandriva company changes name to _________!

Re:Well

[B'Trey]

It was bad enough when your company was named after a duck instead of a penguin.

A duck? A drake is a male duck, but a mandrake is a poisonous plant that is supposed to have magical powers, probably because it's root looks like a human figure. Didn't you ever play King's Quest?

Is there something I'm missing or is this duck thing just confusion because of the word "drake" being in the name?

Re:They can't be serious!

[mikael]

There was a sofa store that was sued for putting up a poster claiming themselves to be "sofa-king-good".

Re:Well

[Otter]

I think the distribution's name is actually a reference to Mandrake the Magician, not to the plant. Hence the magic-related imagery that used to surround Mandrake Linux, and is still present in the star logo.

(I can't believe that strip is still around! Do comic strips ever stop? Does anyone still read Barney Google or Rex Morgan?)

BTW, a somewhat more timeless mandrake reference is Genesis 30:14.

Condrake would've been better

[I_Human]

or Drakecon, or something - Mandriva sounds like a cartoon witch harassing Bugs Bunny.

Really?

[hey!]

I always thought it was a crappy pun on John Donne:

Go and catch a falling star,
Get with child a mandrake root,
Tell me where all past years are,
Or who cleft the devil's foot,
Teach me to hear mermaids singing,
Or to keep off envy's stinging,
And find
What wind
Serves to advance an honest mind.

Mandrake - root -- unix? Get it? Blech.

Re:Changing name over and over..

[Wudbaer]

Oh, that's nothing. I have a really impressing resume with work experience at four different biotech companies - just that they always were one and the same that kept changing names for some stupid reasons. So it's not just open source.

Connectiva, Mandrake

[wowbagger]

Connectiva and Mandrake merge.

How about Con-Man?

No, wait, crap. There's already a Con-Man Linux distro.

Should have chosen AndSoft

[HalliS]

2 years ago, two telecommunication companies merged here in Iceland.
The people that were to come up with a new name, wrote the two names up on a blackboard,

Íslandssími
og
Tal
(which means Íslandssími and Tal )

... knowing that they could use neither one as a name for the new company, and that that they had just partnered up with Vodafone.

So what did they do? They erased the names and were left with og (which means and).
The new company: Og Vodafone, which basically means And Vodafone



So let's take Mandrake and Connectiva, take out the two names and let the new company be called: AndSoft!

Re:Represents WHAT???

[0racle]

Mandrake is supposedly big in France. Conectiva is big in Brazil. Both are at least known of around the world. They combined the two to have a name that has parts of well known names but is not currently tied to any main geographic location then they told the world, or at least the parts that cared. Seems pretty global to me.

Re:Well

[dgatwood]

I can't help but think of Dilbert's merger of Pathway Electronics with E-Technology Co. to form the Path-E-Tech Cormpany....

Maybe it's just me.

Pronounciation

[hyfe]

Sometimes, tt's fun to notice how english centric slashdot is. Given how many Europeans without english as native language there are here, it is kinda surprising at times.

Mandriva; good pronounication in the scandivian languages, spanish, german, french and spanish.

Mandrake; good pronounication in english. >p> Majority of posters complain about pronounication :)