

Ask HN: Please, review wordoid.com, a smart naming webapp - op
http://wordoid.com

======
yummyfajitas
Important point on monetization.

I looked for a domain, found one I liked, and clicked "Buy". You sent me to
godaddy, who I don't use. I opened up a new tab and bought it with namecheap.

A suggestion: give me a price comparison between multiple registrars, and let
me click through to any. That way you get the commission even if I don't use
godaddy.

~~~
nwjsmith
This is similar to what Carl Mercier did with ajaxwhois.com

He talked this year at meshU in Toronto, maybe Wordoid could get some ideas
from his experiences?

[http://www.slideshare.net/cmercier/how-i-founded-
bootstrappe...](http://www.slideshare.net/cmercier/how-i-founded-bootstrapped-
grew-and-sold-my-web-startups-meshu-2009)

~~~
op
Thank you for the link!

------
ironkeith
I opened up the page and just clicked "go"... seemed like a good place to
start. I waited a few seconds and nothing happened.

Then I noticed the little clock at the bottom ticking away. "Okay", I thought,
"it's working..." but 30 seconds later it still hadn't done anything (HN
effect?). I'd disable the "go" button on click, and move the clock so that it
appear right next to it (instant feedback is nice). You can re-enable the "go"
button if any of the parameters change.

Also, in the time its taken me to write this it still hasn't generated any
results (Mac 10.5, Safari 4). Don't know if it's me or you.

~~~
op
ironkeith, this most likely is a HN effect (luckily? :) The webapp has been
developed with performance in mind, however I've already noticed some glitches
to fix.

~~~
mitjak
Well done Oleg but where's the Russian language on the side? =) I don't know
if it's in the works or what, because wordoid just generated veter.com for me
(which is still available). Would definitely be fun.

~~~
alanthonyc
I like this site very much!

However, I'd consider it an advantage for Russian speakers to NOT have Russian
on the list. As a speaker of another language also not on the list, I wouldn't
want any automated competition on coming up with words with that basis. (My
other language has been a gold mine for me. ;) )

------
pierrefar
Good stuff. Had a quick play and definitely would use it to brainstorm ideas.

One really horrible usability point: when I enter a custom pattern on the
right, I can't click enter to submit the form, but instead I have to go across
the screen, up, and click the small Go button. Either do it live with AJAX or
just add a proper form to refresh the page.

~~~
10ren
or perhaps add another submit button on the right, underneath the pattern
choices

~~~
pierrefar
Yes, that's what I meant by a "proper form" but clearly it wasn't phrased with
any level of eloquence.

To build on that: having the form split up is a bad idea. The sidebar serves
no purpose really and I recommend all the form functions be collected at the
top _and_ bottom of the results.

I'd also rename the Go button to something more sensible like "Search" or
"Find". Go has very few good use cases, and even then it's dubious.

~~~
lliles
Along these lines, I would also recommend a graphical button for the
go/search/find. Large, bright and tactile or 3-D (within reason). Make it
clear "this is what you push" after filling out the form. Make it inviting.

I really like this idea. I spent several minutes looking through the
suggestions and bookmarked it for later.

------
op
Wordoid.com is a webapp that helps you come up with a catchy name for your
product, company or domain.

It makes up new words that are unlikely to appear in a dictionary. It knows
how to create words in several languages: English, Spanish, French and Italian
at the moment. It is even able to create words in imaginary "languages",
constructed by blending two or more real languages together.

I would appreciate your feedback!

~~~
jorgem
I like it.

------
mellis
Woah, my last name appeared on the second page of results.

I found the distinction between "order" and "buy" unclear, although the color
coding helps somewhat. Perhaps "backorder" (what Go Daddy uses) would be
clearer? An option to only show available domains could be useful as well.
Maybe an option to specify lengths?

------
hellweaver666
I like it... combining English words with a foreign language seems to make for
some really interesting combinations.

Seems to be very quick as well which is great. Would be cool if it would check
.com .net and .org variants as I wouldn't settle on a name unless all three
were available (+ .co.uk as I'm in the UK!).

On another note, while I was playing with it, the name 'effection' came up and
effection.com was showing as available. I went to my preferred registrar to
buy* and it's actually registered. effection.com was originally registered
back in 1999! So you may need to check out your domain look up code.

*no offence to you, but I work for a registrar by day and get staff rates!

~~~
sho
Yeah, i saw "carlover.com" in green and thought "you've got to be kidding, i'd
buy that in a heartbeat" (I love cars).

Unfortunately, it _was_ kidding.

~~~
op
Wordoid.com checks domain availability by querying a DNS server. This is not
completely accurate, since some domains don't have DNS records. The right way
is to query a whois server. That's tough, because i don't know of any whois
servers that would allow me send bulk queries.

~~~
sho
Could do it yourself - <https://www.arin.net/resources/request/bulkwhois.html>

------
matt1
Great idea! Few recommendations:

Move the search box to a more prominent position, either to the top of right
column or above the domain name list. Like someone else said, move the "Go"
button next to the search box so there's a smooth transition.

I'd remove the box from the main page that lets the user specify "Ends
with..." or "Begins with" and instead, once they've searched, give them the
option to narrow down the search results (ie only show the ends with/begins
options on search result pages).

Don't show domains that people have to buy. You won't get many people to click
them and it adds clutter to the results.

Put more results on the page, as it facilitates easier browsing.

In the search results, you don't need a column for the wordoid and another for
the domain name. Choose one or the other. I would choose the one that ends
with ".com", as it will immediately be clear to new visitors to the site. If
you go the other route and just display the word, put up a small notice saying
"All words are .com" or something to that effect.

You could also make the list of domains links and have the links point to
GoDaddy. (Again, less clutter).

I'm not sure how much the 'Common', 'Scarse', 'Unique' labels help visitors.
Consider removing it.

Add an option to filter by length, as a lot of people seek out short names.

I like the site and wish you the best of luck. I created Domain Pigeon, which
is very similar to this. If you ever want to chat about ideas or monetization
numbers, you can find my contact info in my profile.

------
wmblaettler
Not to be a grammar/spelling nazi, but "scarse" should be spelled "scarce". (I
suppose you could say it's just another wordoid though.)

The results are nice.

~~~
op
Thanks for pointing this out! I should have checked it twice...

------
JunkDNA
Very nice, I've been looking for something like this that actually works and
isn't trivial. I got some really nice results.

First (nitpick point): You've got a misspelling in the page: scarse instead of
"scarce" underneath the bars that show frequency.

The UI on the right is a bit confusing and busy. I suggest removing all the
text around each of the options. I might then put them at the top of the
screen with the "go" button. Move the descriptive text to a little popup (more
info/?/help/whatever) link next to each of the options and shove all the text
in there. Something like:

Languagae (more info): []English []Spanish []French []Italian

is going to be nice and clean.

My gut feeling is that most people are not going to read the text right away
and they are just going to play with it and see what happens. This is why I
suggest a clean UI so they can easily play, and give them ways to discover
what the options do. You don't want to put speed bumps in front of users and
force them to comprehend everything out of the gate.

Another usability point: I got stuck once I typed a pattern in. I tried to
delete the pattern (to go back to random mode), but the site kept using the
pattern. I then realized that instead of deleting the pattern, I had to change
the dropdown menu to be "Create random wordroids". This leaves the text in the
pattern box but does revert to the random setting. I would re-work this with
some ajax or something so that it's not so confusing.

~~~
op
Thank you for your extensive feedback, JunkDNA! I will take your suggestions
into account while making the webapp better.

------
seunosewa
The interface is weird. The form fields are on the right and the submit button
is at the top left, so you have to move your mouse across the screen for each
query.

~~~
mrtron
Yes - people do not read the right bar downwards and then go back to the top
to 'Go' - it is a strange workflow.

Move the right column to the left I think.

------
rman666
This is a really nice naming app. I've looked at a lot of them and this has
produced some of the best names I've ever seen. Congrats!

~~~
stevejalim
Yeah, I was a fan of <http://domainpigeon.com/> for a while, but that got a
bit too restricted for me (as it became more commercial), not to mention a bit
unwieldy to browse through. Bookmarked!

------
oskarpearson
Hi!

Thanks for a useful resource.

If you change your DNS lookup method, I think you'll have fewer false
positives where you list domains as being available, when they actually
aren't.

For example: readia.com is not available, but the wordoid site says it is.

If you do a DNS lookup at the .com core servers, rather than your local
resolver, you'll get a list of NS servers for the domain - if it's blank
there, then you know the entry doesn't exist.

The current problem is occurring because your resolver library is trying to
walk the DNS tree all the way to the DNS servers that are supposed to manage
the domain. When those servers are down or unresponsive, wordoid is marking
the domain as "available" - even when it's not.

Here's an example that I think demonstrates the problem, and a potential way
around it:

dig ns readia.com. @a.gtld-servers.net. ... ;; ->>HEADER<<\- opcode: QUERY,
status: NOERROR, id: 22290

Note that it indicates no error.

For a nonexistant domain the results are different. The NXDomain means "no
such domain". dig ns this-really-does-not-exist-at-all-1321.com. @a.gtld-
servers.net. ;; ->>HEADER<<\- opcode: QUERY, status: NXDOMAIN, id: 43679

Of course, you'll need to switch between the relevant gtld-servers so that
you're a good network citizen, and cache results. See "dig ns com." for a
current list of GTLD servers.

Also, I'd like to echo the comments of other readers - if you place a "go"
button near the input form, rather on the top left, it'll improve the user-
interface significantly.

Thanks again, and I hope the above helps you.

Oskar Pearson

------
nwjsmith
The 'Pattern' option on the side of the page is confusing. When you type in a
pattern, it isn't apparent that you should click the 'Go' button at the top
left of the page. Furthermore, when you type in a pattern and click 'Go', the
default is to produce random Wordoids, not Wordoids containing the pattern.

The pagination at the bottom of the list doesn't give any indication of how
many Wordoids were generated, which would be nice. Also, as others here have
pointed out, the distinction between 'order' and 'buy' is unclear.

Wordoid is incredibly useful, great job!

~~~
op
Well, it appears that the sidebar is confusing and non user-friendly. I will
work on this more.

------
Morieris
I was highly amused by searching for wordoids containing 'fuck'.

On a more serious note, I am trying to find a business name with a partner,
and would have liked a link to a given page of results, so that I can share
them.

~~~
op
Thank you for the idea! I like it. Added to my todo list.

------
papa
Nice work. This is a useful service and I'm bookmarking it since you've
provided some neat naming ideas.

Only gripe, mentioned by others, is that I was a little confused by (a) the
custom settings on the side and enabling them properly and (b) I initially
missed the pagination/next button at the bottom - probably b/c it's below-the-
fold. You should make that clearer, I initially assumed I only got 10 results
back. Maybe add a results count at the top of the page and clear next/previous
buttons at the top as well as the bottom.

Good luck!

------
wvl
For some reason, the redirect links are broken for me in Safari. I get the
message:

Safari can’t open the page
“[http://wordoid.com/RegistrarRedirect.aspx?registrar=godaddy&...](http://wordoid.com/RegistrarRedirect.aspx?registrar=godaddy&domain=example.com”)
because it’s an invalid address.

For some reason (doesn't make sense to me) it seems that Safari doesn't like
the keyword 'domain' in the query parameters, because changing that to
something else actually sends the request.

------
teilo
I got way more interesting results by switching to "Almost Natural".

~~~
op
They really are! I personally like the combination of French and Spanish in
"Almost Natural" mode.

------
sofal
Nice. Does this use a Markov-like algorithm for word generation?

~~~
op
It does.

------
yellowbkpk
It doesn't seem to be working for me. I click on the "Go" and nothing happens.

On second thought, I see the tiny little clock spinning ever so slowly in the
corner. I suggest making that a whole lot bigger and more obvious if it
routinely takes this long to generate any results.

Must be something to do with my proxy here at work: I'm not getting any
results -- even after a couple minutes and tries in different browsers.

------
jlees
Very nice, good for brainstorming if you have a word or concept in mind. Good
job.

(Second the 'went off and bought via my own registrar' though :P)

------
tripngroove
doesn't seem to work at all for me - Chrome 1.0.154.65

~~~
op
tripngroove, could you please elaborate more on this?

------
aik
This is seriously cool. Great idea. Interface is a bit odd and should use some
tweaking, but it didn't take me long to figure out. The look is alright
otherwise, and I like the name.

One thing: The purpose of the site appears to be slightly confusing at first.
Is this a site specifically for finding a domain name? Does it have a broader
purpose? I don't know...

------
thalur
I like it. It wasn't immediately obvious to me what some of the features did
though - the search button and the unique/common graph next to it for example.
I'm also a little disapointed it won't generate names in Klingon - after all,
it offers to! :)

~~~
op
I use it to show that no language is selected and avoid boring error messages.
But may be I will add Klingon some day...

------
markessien
It's nice. It reminds me of domain pigeon, but the words it creates seem a lot
more natural.

------
willcodeforfoo
Anxious to try this out. I just get a blank list of numbers in Safari,
Firefox, and Chrome on Mac. Firebug tells me you're making an Ajax request
once a second, seems... odd?

Clicking Go! seems to do nothing.

------
aik
One more point: While it is trying to figure out if a result is
unique/scarce/common/rare/..., it says "Searching..." underneath. Wouldn't
something like "Analyzing..." be more relevant?

------
bravura
Great! Let me filter is by part-of-speech. Just do a rough guess.

For example, I may only want VERB wordoids.

Also, you should measure how easy and unambiguous the SPELLING is.

------
epoweripi
Great tool. I heart it.

Will be nice to see more languages thrown into the mix. Sometimes you want to
get out of english to explore more options. Will definitely use it more.

------
fauigerzigerk
Brilliant, I love it!

Would be interesting to hear whether you use a purely linguistic approach or
some statistical information about "natural" frequencies as well.

------
KWD
I'd examine relocating the buttons, or adding more to the top. I tended to
just use the Go button over and over, instead of moving the cursor down to the
Next button.

------
michellegreer
Jorgem,

NameCheap is working on an affiliate program. We will keep you posted for sure
via Twitter, newsletters, and our website.

------
newy
This rocks - exactly what I've been looking for.

~~~
op
I'm happy you like it!

------
silkodyssey
A feature I would like is to be able to filter out words according to whether
they're scarce, rare, unique or common.

------
Poleris
I like it but it wasn't immediately obvious how to use it. Perhaps have
something pointing at the right bar?

------
mistermann
Interesting concept, terrible usability.

------
ericb
Useful site! I'd prefer if it generated more than 10 at a time by default.

------
chrisduesing
It would be good if you could filter out already taken names.

------
jcapote
Wow, it's like domain pigeon only way better. Awesome.

~~~
matt1
How so? :)

------
Dilpil
Doesn't work for me. I click go and nothing happens.

------
antirez
Good results both in English and Italian

