Pr3++yG33kyTh1ng

While it used to be a lot worse than it is, certain parts of the I.T. environment at work are still in pretty sad shape.
Our current domain is alright, but the old one is awful.
It is so awful that it has been made a priority to remove all the applications and servers and make the whole mess just go away.
Of course, this involves a lot of migration. Big time decisions need to be made. If this old and crappy stuff is going to get all crammed into our new and less crappy stuff, some ground rules must be established.
Yesterday we met for over an hour about the naming convention for security groups.
These are basically just organizations full of users which streamline the assignment of permissions to data.
This company is global, however, and our workforce is quite diverse.
The names must follow a standard for construction, or we could end up with multiple confusing groups called "Payroll" or "Forklift Safety Inspection".
I quickly decided that we should turn our global nature into an advantage.
The first section of the name should illustrate geography, the second section should demonstrate purpose and the third should indicate the date of creation so that we can tell these new and awesome groups from the old and crappy ones.
Here is the fun part:
We demonstrate region by naming the group with a beer from the area.
The second part ties into mythology and the use of fable to tell a story.
The third part is the date, but everything is separated by underscores, since geeks love stuff named with underscores, beer and mythology.
In that order, actually.
For instance, chemical formulas in Aberdeen would be Guiness_Hephaestus_04252007.
In Singapore, Human Resources is Tiger_Shinigami_04252007.
The Vice President group in Calgary is MolsonDry_Jupiter_04252007.
Australian sales reps fall into the Fosters_Loki_04252007 group.
See? Very easy to remember and completely transparent to the users.
Our admin group is now ArrogantBastardAle_Thor_04252007. Because Thor is awesome and can call down lightning on the users.