I play on a gigantic map and find it essential to name everything in order to manage my empire. For example, I always have tight clusters selected so that I can rename my rally points by their system name for quick reference. I name fleet garrisons also by their system name. I name starbases by type, so that for example, an economic resource mine which happened to be the third I aquired would be MINE ECO3 and I add a "." followed by the number of modules so I can track upgrades - so in the above example if I had a fully developed mine at the end of the tech tree it would have 39 modules and I would name it MINE ECO3.39. This also allows me to easily identify the associated fleet if appropriate. For example, If the mine is in an empty sector it requires protection. I would normally build a military starbase (up to 4) named MINE ECO3.MIL#.#of modules. So the third military starbase in my example would be MINE ECO3.MIL3.61 (assuming it was fully developed). The purpose is to clusters the names together in the trade screen to easily identify associated items. As a convention I also would name the fleet garrison MINE ECO3 FLEET, or fleet # if I chose to have more than one - I say convention because fleets are NEVER tradeable. They must always be disbanded to be sold or traded. I am looking for useful naming conventions that will uniquely identify ships in the trade screen, are easy to use, and provide essential information regarding function and location, i.e. garrison, attack, freighter, constructor. In my previous example, lets just assume it is in the Hoth system. I would establish a rally point named HOTH SYSTEM in the cluster and name, for example, my first economy starbase Hoth ECO1.39 meaning it was located in the Hoth system, was economy starbase 1 and had 39 modules. I typically only place garrison fleets with military starbases, so in my example the first military starbase in the Hoth cluster would be named Hoth MIL1.61. The garrison fleet would be named Hoth Fleet or if it was a replacement Hoth Fleet #. I would name the ships individually Hoth GAR1, etc. I could still use a useful classification though, that allows me to quickly assess the capabilities of individual ships. Some previous posts seem workable.

Wow. That's really really great!

I tend to give each category of ships a general name, and then add a surname to indicate an upgrade. So for example, as the Thalians my Medium halls all have 'Jade' as their first name, then something else as a last name to indicate how advanced they are.

My first generation medium is called the 'Jade Arrow'

Later there is the 'Jade Spear' then the 'Jade Sword'

Sometimes I reverse this. In my latest game as the Krynn, my small halls are named like this -
Brilliant Skylark
Grand Skylark
Genius Skylark

And my Mediums are called
Mocha Expresso
Vanilla Expresso
Decaff Expresso

I used to do this category stuff, but honestly, I rarely have enough ship types that I don't know what a ship is by memory. It's much more fun to attack your enemy with a fleet of Mocha Expressos then a fleet of M2DD83s.

My utility ships (colony, miner, contructor, scout, etc.) tend to get very utilitarian names, like "Colony Ship." I see no real reason to get fancy with ships of that type.

Warships, going from tiny up to medium hulls, get an interesting-sounding classification, but keep the names they are given at creation. For example, in my current game, my medium-hulled destroyers which I use to patrol my space are designated "Spartan class." Each individual ship just gets the name "Spartan" plus the number the computer assigns to it. My long-range attack cruisers, also medium-hulled, are the "Achilles class." These ships have an additional engine, as well as life-support systems, to facilitate excursions into enemy space. Because I have so many of these medium ships, giving each one a unique designation would be far too tedious. The same, obviously, goes for all of the small and tiny ships which are used to defend my colonies and fill out my fleets. My defense fighters are "Centurion class," and my attack fighters are "Hoplite class." The same naming scheme applies.

It isn't until I move up to the large and huge-hulled ships that unique names come into play. Because there tend to be far fewer of these ships, I can usually manage to name them individually, though sometimes it's just the huge ships that get this honor. My large-hulled battlecruisers use a naming system much like you would see in the U.S. Navy, or on Star Trek. The first ship of a class, the pathfinder, takes the name of that class, and each additional ship of that class takes a unique name. Currently, my large cruisers are the "Vigilant class," and other ships of that class are called things like "Intrepid," "Defiant," and "Vindicator." Very dramatic.

My huge-hulled ships, because they are so rare, usually get the same naming scheme from one game to another. As you may have noticed, I'm quite fond of Greek and Roman history and mythology, and I usually only build twelve huge ships at any given time, so some of you may see where this is going. Thus, my largest ships are the "Titan class," with individual ships taking the name of one of the twelve Titans of Greek myth: Cronus, Rhea, Hyperion, Oceanus, etc. So long as an enemy doesn't name one of its ships the "Zeus," I shouldn't have much to worry about.

All of my starbases tend to be named for their nearest star, and each one gets a corresponding rally point with the same name to facilitate upgrades. Military bases get the prefix "Starbase," econ bases get the prefix "Port," and influence bases get the prefix "Outpost." Bases that are located outside of my main space, far from a star system with an inhabitable planet, tend to get the prefix "Deep Space," followed by a number.

Lastly, upgraded versions of existing ships get the suffix "Mk" along with a number designating its generation.

And that's about it. Oh, how I wish some of this were automated. For example, starbases should automatically be given a corresponding rally point of the same name.