Inspired by a newsletter introduction published last year, I've spent the last several months compiling a list of commonly mispronounced self-hosted software names to publicly set the record straight. Some were easy to find, while others required reaching out to developers and support teams privately to confirm.
I've purposely omitted popular mispronunciations that aren't specific to self-hosting (SQL, etc.) as they've been rehashed enough over time. This list is limited to self-hosted and related projects only.
And don't feel bad if you discover you've been mispronouncing one/many/all of them – I also found myself on the wrong end of several (Forgejo was especially a doozy).
Feel free to drop any I may have missed in the comments!
AFFiNE [uh-fine]
Docs, canvas and tables are hyper-merged with AFFiNE - just like the word affine (əˈfʌɪn | a-fine). ⧉
Ampache [am-PA-chee]
The name is a blend of the words "amplifier" and "Apache". ⧉
Bichon [bee-shaan]
Bichon is a type of dog. I happen to have one at home, so I looked up its English name—it’s “bichon,” and the pronunciation follows the English pronunciation.
Budibase [buddy-base]
Buddy-base ⧉
Calibre [CAL-ih-ber]
Welcome to Calibre. ⧉
Ceph [sef]
Ceph (pronounced /ˈsɛf/) is a free and open-source software-defined storage platform that provides object storage... ⧉
Dawarich [duh-vah-ihh]
More like 'duh-vah-ihh' if it makes sense – soft 'h' in the end of it
Dockge [dodge or dockage]
"Dockge" is a coinage word which is created by myself. I originally hoped it sounds like "Dodge", but apparently many people called it "Dockage", it is also acceptable. ⧉
Doco-CD [doh-koh-see-dee]
I never really thought about it, but I like doh-koh-see-de.
DokuWiki [DOH-koo-wiki]
It's spoken like dohkoo, the o is pronounced like in donut and the u sounds like the o in do. ⧉
Duplicati [DOO-pleh-KAH-tee]
I pronounce “duplic” like in “duplicate” and “ati” like in “illuminati”. ⧉
Ente [en-tay]
It's like cafe ☺️. kaf-ay. en-tay. ⧉
etcd [et-see-dee]
etcd is pronounced /ˈɛtsiːdiː/, and means “distributed etc directory.” ⧉
Gitea [/g/i-tea]
Gitea is pronounced /ɡɪ’ti:/ as in "gi-tea" with a hard g. ⧉
Grafana [gruh-FAH-nuh]
Welcome to GrafanaCON. ⧉
Forgejo [for-JAY-oh]
Forgejo is inspired by forĝejo, the Esperanto word for forge. ⧉
Immich [image]
It is pronounced as "image" :) ⧉
Journiv [JUR-niv]
Journiv is a made up word from (Journ)al and pr(iv)ate.
Karakeep [care-uh-keep]
Actually, 'care-uh-keep' is indeed not far. The first “a” kinda gets skipped.
Kometa [koh-meta]
koh-meta is how I pronounce it. ⧉
kubectl [cube control]
The canonical pronunciation of kubectl is "cube control". ⧉
Kubernetes [coo-ber-net-ees]
About five years ago...we started the Kubernetes project. ⧉
Kuvasz [koo-voss]
Kuvasz (pronounce as [ˈkuvɒs]) is an open-source uptime and SSL monitoring service... ⧉
Logseq [log-seek]
It’s pronounced “log-seek”. “Log” for “logbook” and “seq” for “sequence”. ⧉
Manyfold [man-ee-fold]
“man-ee-fold”, (mænifəʊld in IPA). It’s sort of halfway between “many” (because there are lots of instances) and “manifold” (a term used in 3d printing for solid models). ⧉
Matomo [m/æ/-toe-moe]
As pronounced in an audio clip on the Matomo website (with the 'a' pronounced similarly to the 'a' in 'cat'). ⧉
Mautic [maw-tic]
I can see how it might be difficult. Here’s the IPA: mɒtɪx Mau (mall or mom) -tic (fantastic). ⧉
Meilisearch [MAY-lee-search]
We spent a day brainstorming on that. Meili is the God of Forgetfulness in Norse mythology. ⧉
MinIO [min-eye-oh]
Most call us min·eye·oh instead of mini-o and so we chose to reflect that pronunciation in the [new] wordmark. ⧉
Mydia [media]
For Mydia, in my head it’s like media, that was the intent from the beginning.
n8n [n-eight-n or nodemation]
It is "n8n" with all lower case letters. It can either be pronounced "n eight n" or "nodemation". ⧉
NGINX [engine-x]
nginx [engine x] is an HTTP and reverse proxy server... ⧉
ntfy [notify]
ntfy (pronounced notify) is a simple HTTP-based pub-sub notification service. ⧉
Odoo [OH-due]
It is pronounced like this in English (click the speaker icon). ⧉
OPNsense [o-p-n-sense or open-sense]
I'm an absolute fan of "Open-sense", but the Dutch colleagues tend to say "O-P-N-sense" more often. ⧉
Papra [PAH-pruh]
The name actually comes from the French word "paperasse" (pronounced "pap-rass"), which means paperwork or administrative documents, I just shortened it to make it a bit punchier.
Postiz [POH-steez]
posties
Poznote [pause-note]
I would say that in English it sounds like "pause note".
Radicale [ra-di-kal]
The original pronunciation is \ʁa.di.kal\ (as in French, the final "e" is silent). I guess you can use that as the "official" pronunciation. ⧉
redis [red-iss]
"Redis" (/ˈrɛd-ɪs/) is pronounced like the word "red" plus the word "kiss" without the "k". ⧉
RomM [rom]
It depends on who you ask. When I decided the name, as a Spanish speaker it just made sense to pronounce it as "rom" with a larger "m" sound, like literally "romm". But a lot of English speakers pronounce it as "rom-m", so just put it as you want!
searx [serks]
Searx (/sɜːrks/) is a discontinued free and open-source metasearch engine. ⧉
selfh.st [/self hoʊst/]
It's pronounced "self-host" (and the 's' is never capitalized). ⧉
Snipe-IT [snipe-eye-tee]
Snipe-IT is pronounced "Snipe-Eye-Tee". Eye-Tee as in I.T., as in Information Technology. ⧉
Tautulli [taw-too-lee]
verb | tau • tu • li | /taʊ'-tu'-liː/ | To watch or monitor ⧉Technitium [tek-NIH-tee-um]
The name is pronounced as "Tek-NIH-tee-um". Its pronunciation follows the same pattern as other “-ium” words (like “titanium” or “millennium”).
tirreno [teer-REH-noh]
tirreno [tir.ˈrɛ.no] detects threats where they actually happen: inside your product. ⧉
Traefik [traffic]
Træfik (pronounced like traffic) is a modern HTTP reverse proxy and load balancer. ⧉
Vikunja [vuh-KOO-nyuh]
The original name of the animal is Vicuña and Vikunja is the German / Scandinavian spelling of it. ⧉
WeKan [we-kahn]
"Khan", that's what Kanban is. it's Khan-Bahn, not can-ban. ⧉
YunoHost [why-you-no-host]
The name YunoHost comes from the jargon "Y U NO Host". ⧉
Zammad [tsammat]
Thanks! Now I know, “Tsammat”. It’s funny that even the interviewer, with a Bavarian background, didn’t get it right at first. ⧉