@279okshap: To me, all 3 options are both acceptable and...

279okshap
2016-01-09T18:35:41-05:00

To me, all 3 options are both acceptable and necessary, and a system using all 3 would be fine with regards to consistency (since in naming conventions with alphanumeric designations but without official nicknames, option 2 basically just becomes option 3); it's just a question of what aircraft use what option.

I'd personally propose that naming conventions for aircraft be considered, rather than individual names, and that the preference be option 2 > option 2/3 > option 1. My reasoning is that:

Option 2 is generally preferable (plays well with auto-complete, is unambiguous), but also pretty limited in scope.
Option 3 is almost the same but without a nickname, but in cases where the designation itself is already unambiguous (e.g. bf_109, tu-160), the added clarity doesn't really matter. Both 2 and 3 save users from having to deal with monstrosities of names like Lavochkin-Gorbunov-Gudkov and Ling-Temco-Vought. (I say option 2/3 instead of just 3 since in some systems, like those of WWII Nazi Germany and the IJA, some aircraft have designations + nicknames while others only have designations. I figure for aircraft in these naming conventions that have both, they may as well be included.)
Option 1 is necessary in naming conventions that give aircraft easily ambiguous names (e.g. names only, like UK military aircraft, or numbers-only designations, like many civilian and dual-purpose aircraft.)

With this, the US, Sweden, and Yugoslavia would fall into option 2, as designation + nickname is the rule rather than the exception in these systems.
Nazi Germany, USSR/Russia, PRC, post-WWII Japan, and others would fall into option 2/3 or just 3.
The post-WWI UK would fall into option 1.

Now, having typed all that - I don't think this is a good system. In fact, I don't think it's necessarily possible to create a good "system." To me, the best that's realistically achievable (fairly loose) set of guidelines, and whether or not what I've come up with is a good one (spoiler alert: it's not) is immaterial. To me, there are just too many oddities and exceptions to create an airtight tag-naming system, much less while keeping tags consistent and intuitive, and the tag-naming system easy-to-use. (Is [Chengdu] "J-10" unambiguous enough to safely drop the "Chengdu"? Should the Northrop F-5's tag include "Freedom Fighter", or "Tiger II"? Neither? Both?)

I'm tired, so having thus contributed a net total of nothing, I'll add some thoughts on some detail aspects that don't require me to think too hard:

- I feel fairly strongly that post-WWI UK aircraft should include manufacturer names. Simple qualifiers like x_(plane) are still ambiguous in a lot of cases. IMO it'd be easier to just include the relevant company than try to qualify out ten or so airplanes named Firefly that aren't the Fairey naval fighter. In addition, it seems to me that in most cases the company names are equally known/associated with their aircraft anyway. I could be wrong about this, but it seems to me that even for lesser-known aircraft, "Avro Lincoln" or "Boulton-Paul Defiant" roll off the tongue as one coherent unit in a way that "Republic F-105 [Thunderchief]" doesn't.
- When discussing option 1, what I mean is by "companies" is the designer or manufacturer name that's conventionally associated with the aircraft. Hawker (Hunter), not SABCA or Fairey Avions; Sukhoi, not Factory Nr.Whatever or Whatever Else JSC. I don't think license-production or such should affect tags. (In any case, identifying license-built aircraft often requires checking small details or serial numbers that may not be visible.) Of course, there are still cases to be handled like US defense industry mergers (e.g. GD vs. LM F-16.)
- PRC aircraft should probably keep their domestic designations, rather than export ones (J-6 vs. F-6).
- Regardless of if they change under whatever system is or is not adopted, there are some currently incorrect (or unintuitive) tags that need fixing. mirage2000, lacking a space, and ef_typhoon, with a weird nonstandard abbreviation, come to mind as having screwed me up before.
- I am personally what Wikipedia would call a "lumper" and generally favor folding variants and derivatives into fewer tags (especially for less-popular types that don't have a ton of tagged posts in the first place.) I only bring this up because there's a fair few 1-post tags for military stuff that's closely related to already-extant tags. Of course, if Wikipedia has taught me anything, it's that it doesn't matter, since lumper/splitter debates are never resolved and therefore pointless.

Ultimately, I have a pretty low bar for whatever system is or isn't adopted. As long as I can find the tag I'm looking for within a couple stabs at the auto-complete, I'm happy, and that's basically my standard for intuitiveness.

tl;dr: half-thought-out ranting