Device Nomenclature

The golden rule for naming device pages. Choosing a canonical name for a device requires judgment and consistency with the community standards.

We strive to be as readable and consistent as possible, and we have been debating capitalization conventions for some time. After much thought and deliberation, we have finally decided that:

1. All device and manufacturer names will begin with either the first or second letter capitalized, depending on the manufacturer’s naming convention. An iPod remains iPod, but an iPod touch becomes iPod Touch. Similarly, the chumby one becomes Chumby One.
2. Device and manufacturer names that are all-caps, such as DROID and NVIDIA, will instead have only the first letter capitalized, and the rest lower-case. Hence, we call it the Droid. And NVIDIA becomes Nvidia.
3. We will respect camel case—with a name like iFixit, who are we to judge? BlackBerry stays BlackBerry, and iFixit stays iFixit.

These three simple rules will unify the look of our repair database while still preserving the manufacturer’s intent as much as possible.

Please avoid any symbols or special characters. Hyphens for model numbers are by far the most common and the only ones that seem to be okay (Ex.: IdeaPad 110-15IBR). Apostrophes, commata, colons, semicolons, parentheses, plus (+) symbols, and quotation marks should all be avoided.

Sometimes a plus symbol is inherent in a device’s name (Ex: Samsung Galaxy S9+,GoPro Hero3+, 3DR Iris+, SoundLink Revolve+). The plus symbol (+) is much more common than the word (plus) in a device name across the internet, and specifically in the manufacturer’s pages/documents. In this case, use the + symbol.

Devices that have become well-known and popular throughout the world do not need to have its device manufacturer listed in the device page's URL.

For example, a Sony PlayStation 3 device page name URL can be //www.ifixit.com/Guide/Device/PlayStation_3, and an Apple MacBook Pro 17" Unibody's device page name can be //www.ifixit.com/Guide/Device/MacBook_Pro_17"_Unibody.

On the other hand, lesser-known devices should have the device manufacturer listed in the device page URL.

For example, an LG VX5200 phone should include the manufacturer's name in the device page URL, since just the term "VX 5200" may not be known throughout the world as LG's product: //www.ifixit.com/Guide/Device/LG_VX5200

The exception to the rule above comes with products named after the company. Two good examples include Apples's Apple TV and Nintendo's Nintendo DS Lite, whose device pages don't make sense to be named "TV" and "DS Lite," respectively.

Apple loves to throw curveballs with model names. We've had to differentiate between several types of "MacBook," for example. Some are easy (MacBook Air), but some are a terrible problem -- the white polycarbonate MacBook comes to mind. Several flavors of the polycarbonate MacBook look almost exactly the same outside, but have distinctly different layouts once opened. The problem is compounded by the fact that all have the same model number, A1181, and no other unique identifier.

It is very important to be only as specific as needed (see the top heading). This way the device page covers all pertinent variations, such as a Sony PSP 3000 device page covering all PSP 3000s. Otherwise, a device page should be separated into two more-defined device pages if necessary.

We understand this is somewhat of a gray area, so here's an example:

The original polycarbonate MacBook was just called "MacBook."

The second iteration of the MacBook came out, but switched processors from Core Duo to Core 2 Duo. So we made another device page for the second MacBook (MacBook Core 2 Duo), and called the original MacBook Core Duo.

Apple released an updated Core 2 Duo machine, but internally the machine stayed mostly the same. We made no changes to the device page, but amended the repair guides with alternate pictures for the new model.

Apple then released an all-new MacBook, with an aluminum unibody design. We created another device page for this new machine, MacBook Unibody A1278.

As of October 2009, a new polycarbonate MacBook came out, also as a unibody design. This one had more-rounded edges and a new model number: A1342. So we created a new device page for the MacBook, MacBook Unibody A1342.

Device page redirects can be implemented for variations of a device page name. The most common redirect would be to transport a device page that includes a manufacturer name to just the device page using the device's name. For example, a redirect can be implemented on the Sony PlayStation 3 device page to go to the correct page, PlayStation 3.

An alternate use of redirects would be to use them for devices like cars, where a specific generation covers multiple years of the same car. For example, the 1998 Honda Accord device page can redirect to the 1998-2002 Honda Accord device page, since all Accords from 1998 to 2002 are essentially the same car.

We feel the final decision on naming device pages will be decided by the community, so we leave it to you to name the pages as you see fit.

Device pages will definitely start out with more general information, but will be separated by the community into clearly defined devices over time.