• rtxn@lemmy.worldM
    2·
    5 months ago

    It’s a retroactive bastardization of the word based on one particular culture’s one particular interpretation of it (master being, apparently, a slaveowner) that ignores both the much earlier meanings of master artisan or master craftsman (as opposed to journeyman and apprentice) and masterpiece (through which an artisan is recognised as a master), and the modern meaning of a master copy (like a master record in disc printing).

    This isn’t like replacing the “master and slave” terminology with regard to connected devices. That one was warranted because it was often inaccurate and confusing. But forcing the adoption of main instead of master feels like someone got offended on someone else’s behalf because a word looked superficially like that other bad word, and apparently we can’t have an understanding that goes deeper than what letters it’s made up of.

    Amerika ist wunderbar. This is an --initial-branch=master household.

    • PixxlMan@lemmy.world
      1·
      5 months ago

      At some point needlessly banning words just empowers bigots by letting them claim larger and larger parts of the vocabulary. Shouldn’t we try to reclaim words instead, and deprive the words of their power? Just “banning” words, especially in cases such as this one when the connection to master/slave is pretty weak, actually increases the negative power of the words and I’d argue empowers people with malicious intent

    • PotatoesFall@discuss.tchncs.de
      0·
      5 months ago

      regardless of that, it’s never inconvenienced me and it’s still a net gain in readability, since main actually means what it means. have my shell scripts set up to use either one for any repo I’m in automatically.

      • rtxn@lemmy.worldM
        1·
        5 months ago

        Honestly it’s not even about convenience. As far as breaking conventions go, this one has none-to-minimal impact – existing master branches won’t suddenly become invalid. But it’s yet another instance of a subset of a subset of a subset of users getting to enforce their sensibilities for superficial reasons, and ultimately with zero effect regarding the cause they claim to represent; cultural and linguistic differences be damned.

        I’d love to be more specific, but I don’t want the comments to turn into a warzone.

        And don’t pretend like master doesn’t mean what it means.

        • zeezee@slrpnk.net
          1·
          5 months ago

          And don’t pretend like master doesn’t mean what it means.

          Claiming that master on github stems from master recordings is not only disingenuous but also incorrect.

          As a FOSS alternative to BitKeeper, Git naturally reimplemented it’s naming conventions as well - and because of the power of version control - we can actually check what the original meaning was derived from:

          We are then going to modify the file on both the master and slave repository and then merge the work.

          And yes I agree that GitHub just changing the name of the default branch while keeping their ICE contracts is performative as fuck - which imo means we should both boycott GitHub and use naming conventions that don’t have a history related to one of the worst atrocities the global north has brought upon the world…

          • rtxn@lemmy.worldM
            1·
            5 months ago

            I concede the point about the word’s origin… not that I’ve seen anyone ever refer to a branch as a “slave”, nor do I think that it’s appropriate given that the branches are not subservient to the trunk/master/main/etc until one is merged into or rebased onto the other…

            I also wrote a whole-ass speech about the modern world’s relation to the Atlantic slave trade and the guilt certain people are trying to inflict on everyone, but I know what the replies will be (we’re just redditors by another name after all) and it’s ultimately not a soapbox worth dying on. Anyway, my thesis is study history, learn its injustices, and learn how to do better effectively.

        • Nat (she/they)@lemmy.blahaj.zone
          01·
          5 months ago

          People: hey you should think about this a bit and consider changing it to have a small positive impact

          You: 🤬

          Nobody’s forcing you to, nobody’s yelling at you, if you don’t do it it’s not a massive deal, you’re just yelling at clouds. Actually that’s not entirely true; I’m yelling at you because of your absurd overreaction to the mere idea of being a little thoughtful.

          I don’t know if you got it from media, or you heard about this movement and for some reason immediately jumped to “they’re forcing us!”, but you really need to do some self reflection on why you got it so wrong and why you were so quick to do this outburst.

  • SavvyWolf@pawb.socialEnglish
    1·
    5 months ago

    Main.

    Don’t get me wrong, the whole debate is Microsoft just being performative (why not use your vast wealth to actually help people?). But honestly, putting the debate aside, “main” is just a clearer and more intuitive name.

  • mhague@lemmy.world
    1·
    5 months ago

    Using master is stupid. Is your branch in charge of others? Is it more skilled than your other branches? Software engineering has too many crusty dorks that stick to their paradigms like it’s their religion. Acting like it’s their heritage to use outdated terms but also it doesn’t matter so that’s why they’ll keep using it.

  • lemmyng@lemmy.caEnglish
    0·
    5 months ago

    Just use main. I’m not bothered by either, but I’m not in the demographic that would be bothered by master, so I use main and STFU. It takes way less effort to switch to main (if you haven’t already) than to come up with all this rhetoric about why master shouldn’t trigger people.

    • PotatoesFall@discuss.tchncs.de
      1·
      5 months ago

      I would argue that it’s best/easiest to leave existing projects on master, and just use main for new ones. Either way I agree, people arw reactionary af about this issue

  • RustyNova@lemmy.world
    01·
    5 months ago

    Personally I’ve come to hate main because it breaks habits easily. I’m working 75% of the time on master repos, but then I might need to do a quick edit on a main repo and suddenly my git checkout master doesn’t work.

    Or even copy pasting scripts from one project to another can easily break if you forget to change the branch

    The reason behind the change is pretty stupid anyway (I’m against slavery but it shouldn’t be treated like a slur still)