
How to Rename Your Master Branch to Main - justswim
https://www.kapwing.com/blog/how-to-rename-your-master-branch-to-main-in-git/
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andy_ppp
I don't think there is ANY slave connotation assosciated with git. Sure words
do matter and your words are being used to see things that aren't there - the
meaning of the word master has been added to by its use in git repositories
and it was NEVER used in the way that is suggested here; the email thread
claiming that it is used this way is dubious at best. Master, in addition to
meaning "controller" means:

\- main; principal. "the apartment's master bathroom has a free-standing oval
bathtub"

Because it's a master bedroom everyone understands and feels FINE that this is
okay. EVEN in a master/slave hard drive setup (this adds a new meaning too) it
isn't about subjugating disk drives, it's about slavishly copying another
master (main, principal) disk. I'm very sorry if you're offended by words
being used for very specific technology purposes but it isn't right that
everyone has to conform to your way of seeing the world.

EDIT: damn, glad to see that article has been flagged and at this point I'm so
happy that hacker news does not allow politics.

~~~
tgb
Don't be so fast though: the term "master bedroom" is similarly criticized
(and probably with a stronger case for its removal).
[https://yochicago.com/is-master-bedroom-a-racist-gender-
bias...](https://yochicago.com/is-master-bedroom-a-racist-gender-biased-
phrase/30070/)

~~~
andy_ppp
Sorry, it doesn't mean that in any dictionary or in anyone's mind either when
they use the term, so you can argue it is being used to oppress people but I
say the term master bedroom is perfectly okay.

~~~
tgb
I bring it up because if you meant to point to an iron-clad use of "master"
without slave connotations, then you in fact actually brought up an equally
(or more?) controversial example and therefore I don't think it helps the
case. No one who is skeptical of "master branch" will be swayed by "master
bedroom".

~~~
andy_ppp
Probably against the rules to use iron-clad as well. The first warship to be
iron clad was used in the US civil war by the confederacy.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ironclad_warship](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ironclad_warship)

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deminature
At risk of treading into dangerous territory, I've never actually seen any
minorities uncomfortable about master being named as such, just non-minorities
uncomfortable on their behalf.

Master dates back to 12th century latin and has numerous definitions, most of
which have no connection to slavery.

This seems very much like modern slacktivism - a feel good action which
doesn't benefit anybody, least of all the group it was intended to benefit.

~~~
gjsman-1000
Honestly, we could really use a movement around slacktivism. It's lazy, helps
almost nobody, and it discredits movements in the eyes of the general public.

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ehfeng
The name 'main' feels overloaded, just like naming the default branch
'default' or 'development', with the risk of "Who's on first?" confusion,
especially when branching off branches.

"What branch are you on?" "I branched off the main development branch for this
fix." "Like...the `main` main branch or the main branch for the feature?"

I like redis' rename of their default branch to `unstable`. Just like commits
are tagged with the release numbers, the latest code that isn't yet versioned
is by default 'unstable'. If the industry as a whole is going to make this
change, I would prefer we choose a name that can be unambiguously referenced
in conversation.

~~~
hn_throwaway_99
> If the industry as a whole is going to make this change, I would prefer we
> choose a name that can be unambiguously referenced in conversation.

It that case, though, we would name our default branch "stable". We don't
allow pushes to master unless everything has passed our full test suite. I'm
not sure if it's a good or bad thing to have the development model hardcoded
into the name of the default branch - I've certainly worked in long-lived
repositories where we've changed the model over time.

~~~
ehfeng
Sure. I don't know if 'unstable' is the best name for everyone, but if the
industry decides to spend the engineering time to rename default branches, we
shouldn't be just be switching to the first synonym in the thesaurus, but a
word that's actually more fitting than 'master'.

'mastering' is an artifact of vinyl and boxed software. Now that a lot of
software is continuously tested and shipped, 'master' is not the right word
for those processes. Even if you're shipping on-premise software, there rarely
is a single 'master' copy anymore.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastering_(audio)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastering_\(audio\))

As a side note, I've seen people try this, but there is no amount of testing
that can guarantee stability. So, 'stable' feels like a false promise. Also,
in the event of a bug causing downtime, _someone_ always has the ability to
push directly to master and it's always possible that a fix might break a new
commit's tests, even if it fixes the downtime.

~~~
akatom
> As a side note, I've seen people try this, but there is no amount of testing
> that can guarantee stability. So, 'stable' feels like a false promise.

Which, by the same argument, makes _all_ branches unstable. Why would you want
to name, arguably the least unstable branch in the mentioned scenario -
unstable?

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umvi
"master" has meanings other than "owner".

I refuse to kowtow to political pressures that don't actually help minorities.
What's next, Master Lock and MasterCard changing company names to Main Lock
and MainCard?

~~~
gjsman-1000
Whenever I hear "master," I (and I believe most people) think of competence.
Master Mason, Master Craftsman, Master Programmer, etc. That does not mean
historically that those who worked for masters were slaves, as we had
journeymen for example. You can take a look at the guilds in the Middle Ages
as an example of this terminology.

~~~
whb07
This many times over.

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cwhiz
I refuse to even entertain the idea of this. “Master” has nothing to do with
slavery and “slavery” is not unique to any group of people or race. Read a
history book.

Renaming “master” to “main” helps absolutely zero people. It’s just some
pathetic, low effort, virtue signaling.

------
lykr0n
I wonder how long until people start calling developers/projects racist
because they don't make this change.

I'm curious to know who caused this change, but I have a strong idea at what
kind of person it is.

~~~
gjsman-1000
It is really kind of shocking, because we had this whole book called 1984
where the party insisted that members use `newspeak` which was more
politically correct. People thought it was insane and we used to have people
and newspapers across the spectrum decry XYZ (whatever policy under debate) as
being `like 1984`. Using `Orwellian` was a negative term.

And now, here we are, where we can't have an honest discussion about terms
without automatically being slapped as racist despite multiple meanings of the
same word.

~~~
jodrellblank
And this is back to where I commented recently about the "problem with 1984";

"I don't like the terms master/slave, they make me uncomfortable with the
connotations of my ancestor's slavery, can we change them?" -> "NO MORE CAN A
MAN BE ENTITLED TO THE CHOICE OF ASCII CHARACTERS ONE WOULD DEMAND IN A FREE
COUNTRY! THIS IS THOUGHTCRIME BY THE BACKDOOR! ORWELL! TYRANNY! HAS EVERYONE
FORGOTTEN 1984 ALREADY?!"

> " _where we can 't have an honest discussion about terms without
> automatically being slapped as racist despite multiple meanings of the same
> word._"

Except we can have such a discussion, without being automatically anything,
and many people do have said-discussions. There is no accusation of racism in
The Article against people who aren't making the change, there is only a
discussion of pros and cons and reasons. Same (so far) in these comments about
the article.

Newspeak was not a "more politically correct" recommendation of words to avoid
offending people, Newspeak was a reworking of the English language to make it
_literally impossible_ to _think certain thoughts_ , and a combined _revision
of all historical records_ to wipe those ideas out completely.

Asking people to change "master" to "main" like the opening tweet in the
article, "I'm doing this. Join me" is not tyrannically oppressive insanity.
It's not trying to wipe historical evidence of slavery. It's not trying to
change what you can think about.

~~~
dbsmith83
Sure, the article itself is not "tyrannically oppressive insanity" like you
say, but when major corporations start picking up these articles because they
seem en vogue, it can become a little tyrannical in the workplace.

For instance, if this became a D&I initiative, speaking out against it could
be... dangerous. It can have a chilling effect on other people who would
otherwise not agree.

I suppose that has a lot to do with the culture at a workplace. Given the
current political climate with race relations though, it does make it a little
scary to oppose measures D&I related, don't you agree? It would be nice to
have an environment where you can respectfully speak your mind without getting
labeled and/or canned.

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gjsman-1000
I suppose then that we should rename Master's Degrees to Main Degrees. ;)

~~~
smnrchrds
I would like to hear chess grandmains' opinions on this.

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digitalsin
"The main argument for changing "master" to "main" is to reduce the
occurrences of problematic terminology in a team's codebase"

It's not problematic terminology unless you have problematic thinking, which
seems to be more infectious these days than COVID.

~~~
gjsman-1000
Here's the big question: Who is defining "problematic"? Furthermore, what will
be "problematic" 5 years from now?

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hn_throwaway_99
I don't have a problem making this change if it actually makes people of
African descent more comfortable in the workplace and programming communities.
I can understand it more easily for terms like "master/slave", and terminology
that defaults white to "good" and black to "bad".

My problem with this, though, is that it feels like the ultimate in
"slacktivism" mainly put in place to make white people feel better about
themselves. I have rarely (or, actually, never, but to be honest I haven't
scoured Twitter looking for posts) seen black people pushing for these kinds
of changes (as opposed to many other areas where changes would actually make a
difference in the workplace).

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bE9a3S5So8igd3
Thanks I was devastated by the word "master" and now I feel very, very
"welcome"

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diob
I honestly don't know why people are resisting these sort of changes so much.
I think it's due to Parkinson's law of triviality.

It's so easy for people to have an opinion on this, when I would rather change
the offending name and move on to more important things.

Personally, I like the name trunk, since it makes more sense with the
branching metaphor. But ultimately, call it whatever you want, I'll adapt.

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throwaway__987
I work at a $BIGCO and am inclined to do this, not because it will make any
difference, but because it is the sort of thing they will do eventually, and
if I raise it as an issue, it will look good for me.

The company is extremely good at pointless tediousness anyway (our issue types
in jira have been changed three times in the last year, and I could not even
tell you what a bug is any more), so more busywork will be par for the course.

