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Voting is now taking place in the following Q&A to determine which header image to use:

Site Logo Text: Mathematica and XXX. Which wording exactly?

Recently, Arnoud asked in our chat if it is possible to include the term Wolfram Language in our header image:

header logo

Instead of "Mathematica", the text would then be something like "Mathematica & Wolfram Language". As most decisions on our site, we should discuss this with all the people who care about our community and hear their opinion on the matter.

It's no secret that Arnoud is working for WRI, and I assume the idea is driven by Wolfram's PR to push the term "Wolfram Language" rather than a personal suggestion of Arnoud. We have discussed the rebranding of Mathematica to Wolfram Language in great detail and very critically more than a thousand times, but I have the feeling that now, most of us embrace that our language of choice is called Wolfram Language.

Therefore, to me the answer is simple: The addition of "Wolfram Language" makes sense and we should consider it. Please feel free to share your opinions.

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    Personally, I see no value in changing the name. Moreover, short names typically are better than long names.
    – bbgodfrey
    Apr 26, 2019 at 3:11
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    Wouldn't the Wolfram community site rather have that type of traffic? Coding and programming are becoming more and more popular internationally. I think keeping the focus on Mathematica on the Stack-exchange platform is of immense value to this community. I like the wolfram community site (why is it so slow?) so I think they would do a good job.
    – BBirdsell
    Apr 26, 2019 at 4:25
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    Somewhat related, adding WL to the site description, which was done with no objection: mathematica.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/1339/…
    – Carl Lange
    Apr 26, 2019 at 8:29
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    Adding a reference to Wolfram Language might help to reduce the number of posters that think the site is about mathematics.
    – Bob Hanlon
    Apr 27, 2019 at 12:51
  • @BobHanlon here's hoping...
    – b3m2a1
    Apr 29, 2019 at 16:23
  • @BobHanlon I agree with that—would requiring some/any form of WL be included in any/most questions asked here be an attempt at a solution? I would think it should not come across as overbearing, as we (users) would do this anyways.
    – CA Trevillian
    Apr 30, 2019 at 9:05

7 Answers 7

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I'm not sure how widespread this neologism is used, but it does seem to be the way things are going.

I wouldn't mind adding it to the logo as long as it takes second-billing, like:

enter image description here

Could be a harmless goodwill gesture.

Edit halirutan: A more suitable preview with the suggestion of Szabolcs to make the second line not all caps (note that the logo and the colors are not final):

img

Edit C.E.: A notebook for experimenting with the logo text is available here.

This is an example of output:

Logo suggestion

Possible meta logo layout:

Meta logo suggestion

Here is the suggestion of user42582:

Logo suggestion

Edit by Nasser:

Here are two more suggestions?

Mathematica graphics

Mathematica graphics

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    Yes, this is exactly how I'd imagine it as well.
    – halirutan Mod
    Apr 26, 2019 at 11:36
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    I imagined something similar too (minimal change, "Wolfram Language" in small), but what do we do with the Meta logo? There's already "Meta" under "Mathematica" there.
    – Szabolcs
    Apr 26, 2019 at 21:02
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    @Szabolcs I think meta is not so used by the external community in general that we need to worry about it. Like if you're on meta you're probably not the casual user who we're trying to reach out to with the "and WL"
    – b3m2a1
    Apr 26, 2019 at 21:52
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    One thing I'd propose on this is that it be even more second billing. The "and WL" shouldn't allow the site logo to look cluttered, as, at least to my eyes, this does a little bit.
    – b3m2a1
    Apr 26, 2019 at 21:53
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    IMO it wouldn't hurt to include the Wolfram Language as a secondary typographical element in the header; I believe a lighter font color and weight are the way to go; obviously, the real estate of the header should be predominantly dominated by Mathematica; I don't thing the use of conjunction ("and" or "&") is necessary; I like the first banner in this answer (minus the and, obviously); I'd go with it if it were up to me. Thanks @Chris K. for taking the time to illustrate this.
    – user42582
    Apr 27, 2019 at 6:33
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    I would suggest not to use “&” here (no names, different categories...). Dropping the “AND” nicely expresses that Mathematica is built upon the Wolfram Language but offers more than just the language. I like that.
    – gwr
    Apr 27, 2019 at 9:40
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    For reasons beyond my understanding, I like the "& Wolfram Language" moved to the right better than the centered "Wolfram Language". I feel the color should not be as bright and a bit more orange. The font-size however, which is smaller than in my example looks better.
    – halirutan Mod
    Apr 27, 2019 at 11:17
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    I made the text more orange so that it's more similar to whatever color might be chosen in the end.
    – C. E.
    Apr 27, 2019 at 15:08
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    The site description uses the phrase "Mathematica and the Wolfram Language", which sounds somewhat better to me than "Mathematica and Wolfram Language"
    – ilian
    Apr 27, 2019 at 15:58
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    I like the last one "powered by". Nicely done.
    – BBirdsell
    Apr 28, 2019 at 19:09
  • @ilian Can’t really think of any other programming language in need of a “the” - most don’t even need “language” made explicit. Maybe time to touch ground again? ;-)
    – gwr
    May 3, 2019 at 7:30
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    I really like the logo with the 'powered' wording. My +1 was for that ;)
    – An old man in the sea.
    May 3, 2019 at 7:44
  • @gwr I was making a simple point about a definite article (which is moot because people prefer the version with &). Thanks for sharing anyway.
    – ilian
    May 3, 2019 at 11:58
  • @ilian You are welcome. And indeed: De gustibus non est disputandum.
    – gwr
    May 3, 2019 at 12:35
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bbgodfrey said:

Personally, I see no value in changing the name. Moreover, short names typically are better than long names.

I'm posting this here because it is a reasonable position that people may want to vote for.

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    An important question regarding this is how deep the change would go - is it only the header, or also the site name?
    – Lukas Lang
    Apr 26, 2019 at 7:56
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    My understanding was that it was only the header image.
    – Carl Lange
    Apr 26, 2019 at 8:16
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    „Short names typically are better than long names“ is actually in opposition to Mathematica‘s foundational paradigms. ;-)
    – gwr
    Apr 26, 2019 at 8:17
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    @gwr Oh my.. this comment is hilarious and on the spot :)
    – halirutan Mod
    Apr 26, 2019 at 11:39
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    A short name that conveys as much information just as clearly as a long name is clearly better than a long name, but is much harder to create.
    – fp.monkey
    Apr 26, 2019 at 23:55
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As a Wolfram|One user, I do not use Mathematica. However, I do use the Wolfram Language on a daily basis, and help people regularly on the main site.

To me, it is clear that we answer questions about the Wolfram Language, not about any single product that implements the language (Mathematica, Wolfram|One, Programming Lab, etc). Thus I would be strongly for adding "Wolfram Language" to the header image.

Does anybody have some examples of questions that are specifically about Mathematica and not about the Wolfram Language? I don't really think there are many (unless we talk about older versions, where the language and the product are the same thing).

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    What the heck is Wolfram|One ? :O
    – gwr
    Apr 26, 2019 at 10:45
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    Front end or system setup related questions are MMA specific with a subset of them applicable to cloud based products.
    – Kuba Mod
    Apr 26, 2019 at 10:51
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    As a hint: The language behind Mathematica used to be called "M" and we still have ".m" files ... on the other hand, if you are right, than this side must not be called Mathematica any more.
    – gwr
    Apr 26, 2019 at 10:52
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    @gwr Mathematica is still the iconic product, the product most are familiar with, and the system many of us here think of affectionately. Removing that name would run into huge resistance (including from myself). [I know you're not actually proposing that.]
    – Szabolcs
    Apr 26, 2019 at 13:41
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    @Szabolcs Make no mistake, that is exactly how I feel. "Mathematica" is a wonderful reference to the (probably) most universal language of all. The language should have been called "Mathematica Language", "Mathematica" or just "M" in my humble opinion. But now we have a case of vanity.
    – gwr
    Apr 26, 2019 at 13:47
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    From your many answers I have benefitted from, I had no idea you did not use Mathematica. With that knowledge, I would actually be very interested if an example can exist that is exclusively about Mathematica. The addition would also keep those who just ask generic mathematics questions, but those can often have the most interesting/beneficial syntax within answers. To combat that, beyond the name change, we should better enforce non-answer of questions which have no Wolfram Language portions.
    – CA Trevillian
    Apr 30, 2019 at 15:10
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This is just an addendum, not a post representing a suggestion to be voted on.

Carl Lange touched on this, but it's good to point out more explicitly that Wolfram Research now has multiple products under multiple names that all use the same programming language, now called the "Wolfram Language".

Examples: Wolfram Desktop, Finance Platform, Wolfram Engine for Raspberry Pi (which can only be started with wolfram and not math). There is also the Wolfram Cloud where it's the "Development Platform" (and not Mathematica Online) that's accessible for free.

There have also been past discussions about which Woflram products should our site cover? Wolfram|Alpha? System Modeler? Workbench? The current expertise concentrated on this site is clearly for whatever uses the same programming language, which WRI has now called the "Wolfram Language" since 2014.

tl;dr Some of the people who come to our site do not actually use "Mathematica" but they do use the "Wolfram Language".

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In my opinion the both the program and the language should continue to be called Mathematica forever, regardless of whatever rebranding is applied.

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    The language itself IS called Wolfram Language though ;)
    – CA Trevillian
    Apr 30, 2019 at 9:31
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I am not opposed to including Wolfram Language in the header image. I do, however, have concerns about the presence/absence of a definite article.

While I would colloquially say phrases such as "Mathematica and Python" or "Mathematica and C", I would not say "Mathematica and Wolfram Language" but "Mathematica and the Wolfram Language."

Wolfram in this case is an adjective modifying the word language, which I believe (although I am not @bobthelinguist) requires the use of article + adjective + noun.

Another case when articles can be omitted is when the noun is abstract:

"Creativity is useful for programmers" is correct while "The creativity is useful for programmers" is not. Consider then, "Wolfram language is useful for programmers" versus "The Wolfram language is useful for programmers." The latter sounds correct to me.

Perhaps it's nit-picky and not worth discussing; or, it could be a New Kind of English. I'll let the votes decide.

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    Note the difference between TextStructure["Wolfram language is useful for programmers"] and TextStructure["Wolfram Language is useful for programmers"], i.e. when it is written "Wolfram Language" then Wolfram is a proper noun. Hence, I'm not sure "the" is grammatically required, but like many other names this one conventionally has "the" in front and I would prefer to stick to that as well from the perspective of "what sounds best" (I'm not particularly happy about adding to the length of the name though).
    – C. E.
    Apr 30, 2019 at 23:31
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    @C.E. There is something satisfyingly geeky about using Wolfram Language to analyze the grammatical structure of Wolfram language. (Add 'the' where desired)
    – bobthechemist
    May 1, 2019 at 11:22
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While I support this change, there must be a distinction made, then, in our tagging systems. I suggest something like “NOT-Mathematica” for anything not Mathematica in the Wolfram language, and then additional tagging beyond that as to what “NOT-Mathematica” program you might be using WL in, such as Wolfram-One or really any paid add-on program.

Additionally, we would benefit from the additional of a standalone “WL” tag, for questions only about the syntax/WL itself, as opposed to the various programs within which it is implemented.

However, this might this inevitably distract from our Mma-centric nature. As a result, it would make Wolfram Community be a better location to direct those who have questions which fall under the “NOT-Mathematica” set of topics.

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