NO! NO!! NO!!! It's not "ionic" vs "covalent". That's ridiculous. It comes down to the format of the compound NOT the alleged type of bonding, especially where there is no such thing as either "ionic" or "covalent" since all bonding lies along a continuum with characteristics of both.
For a compound of a metal and a nonmetal, or a metal and a polyatomic radical, we use the Stock system. The Stock system (named for Alfred Stock) uses a Roman numeral to indicate the oxidation state of the metal if the metal has more than one oxidation state.
For example, AuCl3 is gold (III) chloride. FeSO4 is iron (II) sulfate.
For a compound of two nonmetals we use the Greek prefix method which uses the prefixes like "di", "tri" or "tetra" to indicate the number of each element in the compound.
For example, CO2 is carbon dioxide, and CCl4 is carbon tetrachloride.
Binary mineral acids are name with the "hydro" prefix followed by the name of the nonmetal modified to end in "ic".
For example, HCl is hydrochloric acid.
For an acid with a polyatomic radical, we modify the name of the radical to end in "ic" or "ous" depending on the nonmetal oxidation state.
For example, HNO3 is nitric acid. H2SO3 (if it existed, which it doesn't) is sulfurous acid.
More help:
http://science.widener.edu/svb/pset/nomen_b.html
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