[w3c/manifest] short_names are too short: allow developers to specify multiple lengths? (#662)

While implementing manifest apps on Desktop platforms, we've noticed an unfortunate pattern in Manifests which is that the `short_name` field is set to something extremely short, presumably to fit in the very tiny space afforded by Android app shortcuts. Examples:

- [Google Santa Tracker](https://santatracker.google.com) `short_name` is "Santa".
- [Remember the Milk](https://www.rememberthemilk.com) `short_name` is apparently "RTM".
  - According to @owencm in a meeting this morning. Is this a PWA? Or just an Android app. It doesn't seem to have a manifest.

I need to do a wider survey, but I'm worried we're going to end up with the `short_name` being excessively short for Desktop use cases (and we don't want to use the full `name` when we mention the app title in menus, for example, "Open link in $APPNAME").

A suggestion from Alan on my team was that we treat `short_name` like `icons` and allow multiple sizes, with the user agent being able to choose which size to use. A suggestion would be that `short_name` can optionally be a list of strings, with the semantics of being increasingly short versions of the app title. The user agent may use any of the `short_name` strings whenever it wants.

For example, Santa Tracker's `short_name` could be:

```json
"short_name": ["Santa Tracker", "Santa"]
```

On Android, we might choose the shortest one, while on Desktop we might choose the longer one. This could be done dynamically based on how much space is available.

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Received on Thursday, 15 March 2018 07:46:59 UTC