SOOOOO I was not expecting to end up having a Tron-sona but here we are

I have chosen my program name:

Aster.

It came to me in the same… overcomplex, interconnected sort of way that ideas usually come to me.

(buckle up for a wild ride into how my brain works!)

There are many different aspects to why it fits. Here are some, in no particular order:

Means “star.” Of course I’ve always felt a connection to stars and outer space. My first love was Star Trek and it’s still right up there.

Aster is also where the word “asterisk” comes from. An asterisk is a cool design that would be easy for me to work into circuit-patterns on a suit— I’m already designing it in my head!

The appearance of an asterisk is also meaningful for me, because it looks like several lines connecting at one point… and you KNOW how my brain loves to connect things (case in point, this whole post)

An asterisk is used in writing to indicate a footnote– again, just like my brain going off on a tangent!

What the asterisk means in programming (wildcard, stand-in for “anything”) is one of the few programming things I have actual experience with beyond HTML, because it’s used in GREP commands, which I use for mass-editing a whole lot of HTML pages at once.

In ASCII, the asterisk is represented by 42, which is my age at this pivotal moment in my life.

There was a whole fan theory that this was Douglas Adams’ reasoning behind 42 being the meaning of life… if the answer to the Great Question is an asterisk, then that means “whatever you want it to be.” (Douglas Adams denied this, and insisted that the number was chosen at random. Which means that connection happened just BY COINCIDENCE, which I like even better!)

And that meaning fits me too, because I AM a wildcard who can do a WHOLE lot of different things.

(One of which is sewing… the pun “Poly-Aster” is relevant to my fabric crafts, and to the fact that I can ALSO do a whole lot of different partners, lol)

Aster rhymes with Castor who may be my favorite character in Legacy.

Also starts with the sound of “ass” and y'know how I love sexy butts.

(an asterisk also kinda looks like a butthole, though that’s really not so relevant to my appreciation of Tron-style program butts)

…Of course, there are programmers all over the real world, and they’ve got more projects going than there are words in any language…

…so GOOD LUCK finding a name that isn’t already taken by some boring RL program…

BUT, the RL program called ASTER is also pleasingly relevant.

It is something called “multiseat software,” which isn’t anywhere near my own meager programming experience… HOWEVER:

- “multiseat” sounds like it could mean “lots of butts” and that’s very cool with me

- what it actually does is allow multiple people to connect to one computer at once… which SORTA resonates with what this identity of mine is for… (interfacing with my peeps online)

Still need to figure out just what sorta job my program-self would have in the Encom system. But needless to say it would be something very versatile, involving connections.