I understand your take and respect it. However, this is the feature I was hoping Voyager would “fix.” Unfortunately, this means it’s time for me to move to a different client, which is sad because Voyager is a great client.

To explain: Since every other client and interface (as far as I know) uses the display name, it becomes confusing when I post under a different name every time I use Voyager. Like it or not, Lemmy has the display name feature, and it is used. You don’t like it for solid reasons, and that’s more than okay. This just makes Voyager not a full client for Lemmy, but an opinionated interface. Instead of implementing your opinion on what Lemmy should or should not do, why not move that discussion to Lemmy itself where these decisions should be made and leave the client to be just that - a client?

It’s your client, of course, so you can do what you want, and I respect that. I don’t want to use such a client, though. So why not make the display name optional as it is everywhere else?

Other clients have their own opinions, of course, but that’s another discussion.

Additionally, I agree that impersonation can be an issue. Still, just because Voyager doesn’t use the display name doesn’t make the rest of Lemmy much safer. Eventually, we might need proper verification on Lemmy and then give color-coded badges or something of the sort.

Other considerations: One, as you said, display names make for better user customization.

Two, hypothetically, instead of ignoring the display name and replacing it with flair, why not have both? Display names can provide personal identifiers, while flairs can add context-specific information like roles or achievements within a community. But as I said earlier, such points are better discussed on Lemmy itself, not Voyager.

Finally: you made an awesome client! I used it for long. Not for posting due to this matter, but it offers a superior browsing experience. Well done!