As any of you parents or soon-to-be parents know, deciding what to name your bundle of joy can be a challenge. There are so many constraints on picking a name — from what it sounds like with the last name, to avoiding names already used by family and friends, to picking a name that works as both an infant and an adult. And when you throw in personal preferences and the feelings of overwhelming responsibility that one occasionally experiences when tasked with naming another human being… well, let’s just say that finding the perfect name can be formidable.

When Jen was pregnant with Evan, we had long discussions about potential names, and we pored over list after list of boys’ names trying to find the perfect one. We were also very secretive about the names we were considering. In fact, no one besides us had a clue what his name was going to be until after he was born.

With Baby #2, who has the time for all that??? First, we’ve got a 2 1/2 year old who demands every ounce of time we can give him. Second, Jen has more medical appointments in one month of this pregnancy than we had during the entire first pregnancy. And did I mention we have a 2 1/2 year old? He’s not much help coming up with names either; he wants to name his new baby sister “Fred”!

That being said, Jen and I have managed to come up with a very short list of possible names, and we’ve even shared some of our ideas with family and friends this time around in the hopes that they might be able to come up with some other names we like.

Unfortunately, around Month 7 of the pregnancy, we sort of stalled out name-wise. Maybe it was because of all the other things going on, or maybe we’d simply fallen into a rut with the handful of names we’d already set aside.

Whatever the case, being a computer scientist and, more generally, a person who routinely approaches problems from an algorithmic point of view, I decided there was more I could do to facilitate the process of naming our second child, and the web-based Baby Name Picker was born.

This interactive tool presents the viewer with successive pairs of names, asking them to pick their preferred name (or, in some cases, the one they “hate the least”) from the pair shown. Each selection eliminates one name from the running. The first round ends after each name has been put up for consideration, at which point half of the names have been eliminated. The remaining names, all of which were preferred over a name in the previous round, are then shuffled and paired up with each other. The process continues until a single name remains.

It’s a very simply concept, but in addition to producing a real suggestion for a name you might actually like to use, the process of repeatedly picking a preferred name helps to identify what kinds of names you like and dislike.

Now, you are probably asking yourself, “Is he serious?” And the answer would be, “Of course!” But if you’re thinking that I’ve derived absolute certainly from this crude tool about what name we should give our little girl, you would, of course, be very wrong. As with so many things in life, it is not the end result from which we derive benefit, but rather it is the process itself that yields the most valuable reward. My real goal in building this tool was to 1) expose myself to names in a more methodical manner and 2) force myself to express real preferences about possible names. And in that regard, it absolutely works.

And now it’s your turn to help us out!

The Baby Name Picker is currently set up to pick girls’ names only, and we’re asking you to try it out. When you’re done, leave a comment to this post with your results.

This entry was posted by Steve on Sunday, December 2nd, 2007 at 2:40 pm and is filed under Family, Friends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.