Tab Killer Naming Convention Justification

Tab Killer Naming Convention Justification | Generated by AI

Home 2026.05

Question: Should the repository/tool be named tabs-killer or tab-killer?

Answer:

tab-killer — singular.

Reasoning:

The tool kills the concept of a tab (or tabs generically), not a specific collection called “tabs.” CLI tools conventionally use the singular noun for what they operate on:

file-watcher, not files-watcher
process-killer, not processes-killer
port-scanner, not ports-scanner
vim kills buffers, grep finds lines — always singular

The pattern is <singular-noun>-<verb-agent>. You’re building a tab killer, like a bug killer — not a bugs killer.

tabs-killer reads as grammatically awkward — it sounds like “a killer of tabs” phrased by a non-native speaker. tab-killer is idiomatic English and consistent with CLI tool naming conventions.

Recommendation: Rename to tab-killer. Since it’s your repo, a simple GitHub rename + update README. If you have any aliases or scripts pointing to it, one sed pass fixes them:

sed -i 's/tabs-killer/tab-killer/g' ~/.zshrc ~/.bashrc ~/your-scripts/**/*.sh

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