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GitHub is working on renaming default branch from “master”

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Re: GitHub is working on renaming default branch from “master”

#91

Post by orev »

kickopotomus wrote: post #20

Honest question: are there people out there who are legitimately uncomfortable/upset about the usage of the terms "master" and "slave" in the context of technology? Or is this more so people trying to be too socially "woke" and assuming something to be offensive when it is not? Master/slave are pretty commonly used terms whenever we talk about things like distributed systems and communication buses. Essentially every…

The word “master” still makes sense to me, as it has many different meanings, most of which are appropriate for how they are used in technology.

However I have always felt that the word “slave” (as the counterpart to master) was/is a mistake. It seems to be a relic of the past where people weren’t really thinking through the terminology they chose.

More modern approaches typically use other word pairs, like master/minion, sever/client, active/backup, master/agent, etc. Different pairs are chosen that better describe the relationships, and I suspect those choices were made, at least in some way, to avoid using the term “slave”.

Re: GitHub is working on renaming default branch from “master”

#93

Post by m0xte »

NobodyNada wrote: post #58
zucker42 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume this only applies to new repositories.

So... 5 years from now will we have to constantly guess whether old repos are using “master” or “main”?

This. It is hard coded all over the place in thousands of things.

In fact is it even git any more if the master branch isn't called master? Nope it's an incompatible fork by Microsoft purely by a chance encounter of irony.

Re: GitHub is working on renaming default branch from “master”

#94

Post by shockinglytrue »

mansr wrote: post #34
silveraxe93 wrote: post #6

This is just so damn pointless. It will cause some "great" controversy, people will be called white supremacists for refusing to stop saying master. Now even if this catches on, then yeah OK I'll start naming my branches as main unless I want to make a political statement, which would just add to confusion when developing. Meanwhile these people will pat each other on the back, yell "yeah! We sure made a difference."…

> just... why? It's called "virtue signalling," I'm told.

I prefer Newspeak

Re: GitHub is working on renaming default branch from “master”

#95

Post by tzs »

techntoke wrote: post #64
snlacks wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This forum should be above intellectually disingenuous comments such as this. This isn't Facebook, I'm not going to meme back at you. If you don't understand BLM at this point, that is a decision you've made and you will live with the moral and other implications. Edit: likewise, it's perfectly reasonable to think the GitHub/git trend is silly or ineffective. But keep in mind that "virtue signalling" goes both ways.…

So you're saying that Muslim people or Native Americans have not been targeted and discriminated against, and rather than have a movement that encourages justice and equality for all we should just focus on one race to unite us all? If I put a sign in my front yard that said White Lives Matter, would that not be considered racist?

I saw someone make an excellent point, when someone else was asking why we have a black history month in the United States but not a white history month. He said that we don't have a white history month because every month is white history month in the United States.

Re: GitHub is working on renaming default branch from “master”

#96

Post by crocodiletears »

aespinoza wrote: post #46
zucker42 wrote: post #14

I'm a strong supporter of social justice. I don't really object to people putting in work to change language like that if they think it's important. Especially when the work required is minimal. That said, this is slightly ridiculous. Have customers seriously complained about the term "master"? And my impression was that the usage was more similar to "master copy" than "master of the plantation". Honestly, it's frust…

I am right there with you. The whole idea of "master" is not really based on the idea of slavery focused master. Master represents the final version of a component or software which ends up in production. It is the same meaning as an audio master ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastering_(audio) ) If the word master is considered evil, then what would happen to a Master Degree ? or Dojo Master ? Words have different…

Looking forward to the 'mega-debtor' degree tier.

Re: GitHub is working on renaming default branch from “master”

#97

Post by _never_k »

zucker42 wrote: post #14

I'm a strong supporter of social justice. I don't really object to people putting in work to change language like that if they think it's important. Especially when the work required is minimal. That said, this is slightly ridiculous. Have customers seriously complained about the term "master"? And my impression was that the usage was more similar to "master copy" than "master of the plantation". Honestly, it's frust…

The terminology of master/slave architecture is a direct reference to the working relationships between people on an antebellum plantation. Names should help you understand what things do, and those names do. We also have node that elect leaders, nodes that get fenced, nodes with parents and children, etc...

The terminology of our software architecture, and of our software in general, mirrors that of the real world relationships that they model, reference, or are inspired by. That's a good thing. It helps us understand these systems. It's also true that if this terminology references something we don't like in the real world, we're free to change it. After all, master/slave architecture isn't a perfect modeling of a plantation, it's substantially abstract from that. There are many other relationships in the real world which could be used to describe this architecture.

Terminology is effective when it's stable, so we should be conservative about changing it, but that doesn't mean we should never change it.

Re: GitHub is working on renaming default branch from “master”

#98

Post by zucker42 »

Foxboron wrote: post #45
zucker42 wrote: post #14

I'm a strong supporter of social justice. I don't really object to people putting in work to change language like that if they think it's important. Especially when the work required is minimal. That said, this is slightly ridiculous. Have customers seriously complained about the term "master"? And my impression was that the usage was more similar to "master copy" than "master of the plantation". Honestly, it's frust…

>And my impression was that the usage was more similar to "master copy" than "master of the plantation". Evidently, this is a relic from bitkeeper which uses the "master/slave" terminology. https://github.com/bitkeeper-scm/bitkeeper/blob/master/doc/H... https://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2019-May/...

I was somewhat aware of Bitkeeper, but crucially,

1. There are no slave branches.

2. "My impression" was my impression as someone new to git. I'm extrapolating other people, but I think it's fair to say that many (most?) people won't make the connection to chattel slavery.

3. Git is not directly modelled off Bitkeeper.

But like I said, I don't object to people changing the name, but more to people thinking changing the name is important.

Re: GitHub is working on renaming default branch from “master”

#100

Post by 0x3d3d3d »

These kind of requests are super US-centric without any regards to the rest of the world.

I understand these things stem from a place of discomfort with the racial crisis in the US - and I applaud the intentions.

However, these requests are not inclusive to:

- The foreigner in your team trying to think and communicate in English, while tip-toeing around whatever was deemed offensive this week on Twitter.

- The developer in Botswana trying to keep up with this week's terminology changes as dictated by Twitter influencers in the US.

I dread the day when someone gets in trouble for saying "Hey guys, I added the URL in the whitelist and pushed it to master"

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