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The burning question I need the Super User community to answer is:

Related to this is the general question of how questions about PC components are tagged on Super User. We have:

In general, these tags divorce the type of component from particular implementation details. I think this is a good thing.

So a question about a USB wireless dongle (w/c/sh)ould be tagged "[wireless] [usb] [network-adapter]" instead of "[usb-wireless-nic]" (or something similar). There are already tags for the major buses: [isa], [pci], [pci-express], [expresscard], [pcmcia], [usb], [firewire], [sata], [pata] (there's also [ide] but that's generally used for development environments rather than storage technologies), etc. (Right now the only major tag that diverges from this (to my current awareness) is [usb-flash-drive], which I think ought to be "[usb] [flash-drive]", but memory storage tags may need to be another discussion.)

However, calling these components "cards" (as in the current [foo-card] convention) is really a legacy terminology. It's common but not always appropriate. If these were USB devices, we'd probably call them "adapters" instead of "cards". More specifically, we're usually talking about the controller chipset that makes the device do whatever it's supposed to do, so "controller" is probably the most accurate term.

So, in the interest of consistency:

  • Should [network-adapter] be changed to [network-card]?
  • Or should all the [foo-card] tags be renamed [foo-adapter] or [foo-controller]?
  • Or is there another solution that will be easy to remember and consistent?
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  • i'm starting to think that combining [tv-tuner] and [capture-card] into [tuner-capture-card] would be the best option...
    – quack quixote
    Commented Jun 3, 2010 at 8:26

2 Answers 2

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While I'd vote for graphics-card and tuner-card, I can't see these working long-term without some kind of tag synonym system.

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    the grass will continue to need the occasional trim until the tag synonym system is in place. that's ok, I have a power lawnmower. i just need to know what the community wants the landscaping to look like when i'm done.
    – quack quixote
    Commented May 24, 2010 at 21:36
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video-card(s) / videocard / gpu (if any) => graphics-card

In general foo-adapter / foo-controller / foocard => foo-card

I don't have the data ready with but I believe most people are likely to search as [foo card] rather than [foo adapter] or [foo controller]

As for tv-tuner / capture-card / tuner-card -- tv-tuner is the common name and I believe questions related to those should be (re-)tagged as such

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  • there are a few questions tagged [gpu] (35) and/or [integrated-graphics] (13). thanks for bringing that up.
    – quack quixote
    Commented May 25, 2010 at 4:24
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    Careful of [gpu] as that's used by some as a computing platform (it's a SIMD architecture IIRC).
    – Donal Fellows
    Commented May 25, 2010 at 8:11

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