"RMWeb"

[Harlequin]

I have a question: This has been bugging me for a while...

 

Why is the "w" in RMweb not capitalised? If only the first word in the phrase "Railway Modelling Web" was capitalised, like a normal sentence, it would be "Rmweb". If every word was capitalised, like an acronym, it would be "RMWeb". But "RMweb" makes no sense!

 

I'm a programmer and when we run words together we use "camel case", e.g. "WeRunWordsTogether". (It's called camel case because it has humps...) So my fingers are incapable of writing RMweb, they always capitalise the W.

 

😃

Edited December 21, 2023 by Harlequin

[SouthernRegionSteam]

Interesting question (I'd be amazed if it hasn't been asked before at some point though!).
Obviously I can only guess on why, but, a few thoughts popped into my head...

1. 'RM' is written as initials, whereas 'web' is shorthand (so I guess you could even argue it should be RM'web (!))
2. 'RMweb' is much easier to read and decipher than RMWeb in my humble opinion - particularly as everyone knows that web is shorthand/slang for the world wide web/internet. Should you read it as RMW-eb, or RM-Web... see what I mean? It seems 'modern' (I use that term loosely!) not to capitalise some parts of titles, especially if the non-capitalised part is a descriptor.
3. 'RMWeb' looks ugly to me!

It'll be interesting to see the real reason though!

P.S. Thanks for the explanation of camel case - I always wondered why it was called that.

Edited December 21, 2023 by SouthernRegionSteam

[Mikkel]

My guess is it looks better, and can instantly be decoded visually.

[Miss Prism]

I think of it as 'RM-on-the-web', so have no problem with a lower case w. I thought of Wells-on-Sea, but apparently that has become Wells-next-the-sea. Frinton-on-Sea still has a capital S, so all sorts of weird variations are possible.

[AY Mod]

10 minutes ago, SouthernRegionSteam said:

'RMWeb' looks ugly to me!

 

It's just that, well done Jamie.

 

When I looked at the way to present it nearly 19 years ago I looked at the various forms; no sensible domain based on RMW was available hence the inclusion of web at the expense of the capital W. The RM was capitalised to show it stood for something; railway modelling.

 

It's also easier to say RMweb than RMW - by two syllables. Many know just what it is now.

 

My pet peeve is anyone in the business not using the correct form within the basis and especially in any external communication; if users get it right why can't people in the business?

[woodenhead]

He would have called it BRMweb but it was taken at the time 🤣

 

 

[AY Mod]

8 minutes ago, woodenhead said:

He would have called it BRMweb but it was taken at the time 🤣

 

It wasn't at the time but I suggested it would be prudent to book it when the move to Warners was made. The MD felt the two brands should stay distinct.

[woodenhead]

There was still the BRM Forum or whatever it was called, the thing that made you decide you could do something better than it's text based format.

[woodenhead]

When it comes to the basic format, content and style there is still nothing else quite as good as RMWeb.

[AY Mod]

8 minutes ago, woodenhead said:

There was still the BRM Forum or whatever it was called,

 

I think we're still waiting for IT to fix it.

[SouthernRegionSteam]

And... just to play Devil's advocate... none of this upper/lowercase thinking really matters when it comes to typing in the URL, as it is all lowercase! 😅

[martin_wynne]

1 hour ago, Harlequin said:

I'm a programmer and we use "camel case" when we run words together, e.g. "WeRunWordsTogether".

 

Who's this "we"? I hate camel case.

 

I use underscores, which is 10 times easier to type and read: we_run_words_together.

 

Martin.

[AY Mod]

1 minute ago, martin_wynne said:

I use underscores

 

Another pet hate; domains with underscores or hyphens.

 

Yeah, yeah; we all know about Pen Island and Who Represents etc.

[Harlequin]

It's subjective, I know, but to my eye "RMweb" looks ugly.

 

My position is that, even though "web" might be used in the phrase "world wide web", people commonly just refer to it as "the web" and "Web" is a valid standalone word in any case (ho ho).

 

So "Web" has equal value to "Railway" and "Modelling" and thus should be capitalised like they are. That is actually how you see lots of folks write the forum name (see current status messages...)

 

😁

Edited December 21, 2023 by Harlequin

[PhilH]

While we're on the subject of totally unimportant things to get annoyed about I get annoyed that I have to go to all the bother of pressing the uppercase key for the RM in RMweb, so much easier if it was all lowercase. For us old people any little bit of energy we can save stands us in good stead.

Edited December 22, 2023 by PhilH

[TheQ]

Just type it in lower case the next will find it anyway.

[stewartingram]

It is what it is. Andy introduced it as RMweb and we should accept it and respect that.

[Wheatley]

At LeAsT iT's NoT rMwEb.

[Colin_McLeod]

2 hours ago, woodenhead said:

When it comes to the basic format, content and style there is still nothing else quite as good as RMWeb.

 

You mean RMweb surely lol 😀

[LBRJ]

I have always been in the it looks better camp, and it also conveys the meaning and scans better as you read it.

 

One assumes ( always a  bad thing to do that!) that it is a portmanteau of Railway Modelling website, which, of course, is exactly what it is.

If the w was capitalised then it would read more as R M W eb and not really make sense ;)

Edited December 21, 2023 by LBRJ

[woodenhead]

3 hours ago, AY Mod said:

 

Another pet hate; domains with underscores or hyphens.

 

Yeah, yeah; we all know about Pen Island and Who Represents etc.

Could you explain with pictures for those of us who are naive 😁

[Simond]

Just to be awkward, on the odd occasions that I’m referring to RMWeb in text, rather than verbally, I always type “RMW”.  
 

Everyone seems to cope.

[Simond]

Then I noticed this, which raised a smile.

 

 

the url is in lower case as expected, but the tab name (which I assume Apple assigned, this is on my iPad) has the “W” capitalised.

[martin_wynne]

2 hours ago, Simond said:

the url is in lower case as expected, but the tab name (which I assume Apple assigned, this is on my iPad) has the “W” capitalised.

 

The tab is the title of this topic, as written by the OP.

 

Martin.

[AndrueC]

18 hours ago, AY Mod said:

My pet peeve is anyone in the business not using the correct form within the basis and especially in any external communication; if users get it right why can't people in the business?

Hah. Reminds me of my last job. I was also a computer programmer and we spent four years working on a new (large!) project. Millions of lines of code split across a dozen projects (client, server even mobile), hundreds of database tables. Then during the first pre-launch meeting the MD told us he didn't like some of our terminology (eg; 'document request' should be called 'job'). He had of course heard all these terms during previous meetings but apparently either didn't take it in or just failed to make the contextual connection.

 

So for the last three years I worked there on our shiny new project as it made its way out into the bright world titles, captions, change and feature requests all referred to things that often had no direct equivalent in the source code.

Edited December 22, 2023 by AndrueC