Naming Conventions: tld.company.product

[iMAVERICKam]

I have been using Macs since Jaguar (10.2), and have seen this file naming convention in several places for a long time, but I still don't get the reason. Why are there files named in the format of tld.company.product?

For example: com.apple.AddressBook.plist in ~/Library/Preferences (if you use Address Book)

I can understand company.product, but why the heck is there a tld prepended?

 

[kastenbrust]

It must be for some databasing purpose, maybe for Apples software archive?

 

[wrldwzrd89]

I have been using Macs since Jaguar (10.2), and have seen this file naming convention in several places for a long time, but I still don't get the reason. Why are there files named in the format of tld.company.product?

For example: com.apple.AddressBook.plist in ~/Library/Preferences (if you use Address Book)

I can understand company.product, but why the heck is there a tld prepended?

This convention is widely used in the programming world. It's called Reverse-DNS naming, and its purpose is to minimize name clashes. For example, let's say Company A and Company B both make a product called SwipeToy for Mac OS X. If they both called their program's preference files SwipeToy.plist, they'd constantly overwrite each other if used together. Hence, the com.company-a.swipetoy.plist and com.company-b.swipetoy.plist convention that exists today.