Naming of the ecosystem

[kpto]

As more and more packages with relation to BioCypher are introduced, an ecosystem around it is gradually forming and this ecosystem, at the time of writing, is often referred as BioCypher. The multiple uses of the name on both the ecosystem and the actual package is causing confusion and a new name is needed. @slobentanzer proposed to use the newly created project, the CLI interface for packages in the ecosystem, Biotope as the name of the ecosystem.

It's not uncommon for ecosystems to have the same name as their primary interfaces such as .NET, docker and anaconda so the use of Biotope seems sensible but the direction of Biotope may need to be adjusted a bit to better fulfills the purpose as an entry point of the ecosystem. Comments and concerns will be put here.

[slobentanzer]

Not sure I agree a new name is "needed"; this is often just a matter of definition and of users getting used to the name. We have some prior investment in the BioCypher name; people know it, our web domain is called like that, our Zulip chat, etc. Additionally, getting a domain registration for biotope seems difficult; all the regular domains (.org would be preferred) are taken (but there are no websites there). I count myself lucky that I managed to get the PyPI entry for biotope.

That being said, using biotope as an umbrella to make the ecosystem components accessible, particularly with synergistic projects like ontoweaver (@jdreo), seems like a good idea. We will probably still have entanglement of the ecosystem name (as per web domain, Zulip etc) and the biocypher KG library for a while.

[kpto]

Let alone the marketing benefits, even for internal discussion it is confusing to me whether you are referring to the package or the ecosystem when you say the name. Particularly when the discussed topic involves both of them. We may discuss our marketing strategy later but for the sake of our communication I do feel the need to come up different ways to call them.

For instance, the universal config file I mentioned. A sentence would be something like This is a universal config that is used in BioCypher where BioCypher just needs to read the section marked as BioCypher. Other components in BioCypher that wish to know the settings of BioCypher can also read the section.

[slobentanzer]

Agree that the marketing is not the worst concern as of now. Re the confusion; can't we just say ecosystem when we mean that? What exactly do you have problems with? I have not had this issue before; but then again, I am probably the worst person to ask. 😬