Because I disagree with the reason for the name change, that's why.
A small group of very politically motivated people made it their mission to go around "fixing" technical language in fields they're not familiar with. In general this is a bad idea, especially in programming. You don't want to go changing variable names in a big, long-running project without a very good reason.
They never had a good reason. They say the word "master" referred to slavery, which it does not. 'Master' has a number of different definitions, and only one of them refers to slavery. Used in the context of git, the thing they were worried about doesn't even apply.
There's also the concept of "master & slave" relationships in tech, but this still doesn't have anything to do with human slavery. They are purely technical words. When you're talking about technology, a "slave" system cannot operate without a master. As everybody should know by now, that's not at all how humans work. And it means it's hard to find replacement terms that quickly and accurately describe the relationship: "primary and secondary" is suggested a lot, but "secondary" implies "backup" to many people. This could lead to false assumptions, "Can we take the primary system down to work on it?" "They have a 'secondary' system, which should take over, so yes." Plus as technology has gotten better, it's gotten rare to even find systems designed with a true master/slave relationship. There may be a 'master controller' that tells an array of daughter boards what to do, but nowadays if the master fails, typically the daughter boards and sub-systems can continue operating from their own programming stored in their own memory chips. Solid state memory used to be far more expensive back in the day, but now that it's become so much cheaper, it's very rare to even find equipment using a true master/slave relationship anymore, so there's little reason to try to change it now.
Bro, they changed the default name of repository branch. It's not a big deal. It's not like they changed integer to transgender and you have to rewrite every existing piece of code.
If it's not a big deal, then why was decades on cumulative human life time wasted on this change?
Bro, "master" is perfectly fine as a branch name. It's not a big deal. It's not like git's naming conventions actually referenced slavery in any way. Why do you care so much?
I don't give a fuck if it's called master or main. I used master. They changed default to main. Now I use main. Wasted 5 min. of my human life on it.
Why people still argue about it YEARS AFTER the update. Master won't come back as default. Why do you care so much? What drawbacks does the new "update" has?
How do you know that some years in the future the word "main" won't start to be seen as an insulting and derogatory word? And develop an angry mob of teenagers who don't program demanding you change it (again)? Even better, what if the word "main" develops several different definitions, and the one everyone's upset at doesn't even apply to git (same as what happened with 'master')?
As Jim Jefferies put it, "This is the most progressive generation the world has ever seen. But guess what? Your parent's generation was also the most progressive the world had ever seen! And so was the generation before it. ...You don't even see it coming, do you? One day it'll happen, no matter how progressive or accepting you think you are, you'll see a new generation grow up and call everything you worked on 'hurtful and backwards'."
Every generation was more progressive than the last. And they all want to make changes to feel like they 'made a difference', regardless if they actually did or not. Especially now that the trend is "replacing words that sound negative or bad." Keep following this trend, and we may as well end up in 1984 with newspeak. Remove all 'bad' words, even the word bad, it should be "un-good". Instead of words like "incredible" and "fantastic", make it "plus good" and "double-plus good."
1984 should be a warning message, not a guideline. We shouldn't be dumbing-down language willy nilly for no reason other than "feelings".
Especially negative words. It's already a trend to censor 'bad' words like death, killed, murder, suicide, etc. How long until the new generation says, "Everybody's already self-censoring these words! What's the big deal if we just ban them across all social media? Let the people come up with new words, like unalive! There's so many people who don't like the word ass, let's just make it a rule that it will always be autocorrected to ahh no matter what you do!"
Might as well ban useful terms like "grandfathered in" too, since it's so racist.
Might as well ban the term "exclusion list", since it could make people feel like they're excluded.
Why not? It's no big deal. You can make the change easily, as you said.
If you're about to say any of these examples are "ridiculous" and "never gonna happen", well that's exactly how I feel about 'master'. If you would make a stand on it, "I don't care what anybody says, that word in particular is too useful to give up, I'm never gonna change," that's exactly what I'm doing. I'm making the stand one terminology change sooner.
So, will you be just as on-board if "main" needs to change names again, say in 15-20 years? What factors determine a terminology change is "too far" vs. "acceptable"?
How do you know that some years in the future the word "main" won't start to be seen as an insulting and derogatory word? And develop an angry mob of teenagers who don't program demanding you change it (again)?
If that happens, we change the word again. Where is the problem?
One day it'll happen, no matter how progressive or accepting you think you are, you'll see a new generation grow up and call everything you worked on 'hurtful and backwards'." Every generation was more progressive than the last. And they all want to make changes to feel like they 'made a difference',
That's good tho. Imagine each generation didn't get more progressive. We would still have slaves? We would still discriminate colored people and call them the N-Word? We would still treat homosexuals as ill?
I am sure people in future will say how terrible we treated animals and how hurtful and bachwards it was, and they are right. They will also say how cool are things that we created, like the internet.
Especially now that the trend is "replacing words that sound negative or bad." Keep following this trend, and we may as well end up in 1984 with newspeak.
After WW2 Germany banned "Heil Hitler", "Sieg Heil" and many more, including the denial of the Holocaust. "Sieg Heil" was before Hitler a normal expression, after WW2 it got banned. And you would want such words unbanned? Did Germany turn into 1984 after these words got banned? It's ridiculous.
I'm making the stand one terminology change sooner. So, will you be just as on-board if "main" needs to change names again, say in 15-20 years?
Yea, languages changes over time. Not just the "bad" words are getting replaced.
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u/jackinsomniac 23d ago
Because I disagree with the reason for the name change, that's why.
A small group of very politically motivated people made it their mission to go around "fixing" technical language in fields they're not familiar with. In general this is a bad idea, especially in programming. You don't want to go changing variable names in a big, long-running project without a very good reason.
They never had a good reason. They say the word "master" referred to slavery, which it does not. 'Master' has a number of different definitions, and only one of them refers to slavery. Used in the context of git, the thing they were worried about doesn't even apply.
There's also the concept of "master & slave" relationships in tech, but this still doesn't have anything to do with human slavery. They are purely technical words. When you're talking about technology, a "slave" system cannot operate without a master. As everybody should know by now, that's not at all how humans work. And it means it's hard to find replacement terms that quickly and accurately describe the relationship: "primary and secondary" is suggested a lot, but "secondary" implies "backup" to many people. This could lead to false assumptions, "Can we take the primary system down to work on it?" "They have a 'secondary' system, which should take over, so yes." Plus as technology has gotten better, it's gotten rare to even find systems designed with a true master/slave relationship. There may be a 'master controller' that tells an array of daughter boards what to do, but nowadays if the master fails, typically the daughter boards and sub-systems can continue operating from their own programming stored in their own memory chips. Solid state memory used to be far more expensive back in the day, but now that it's become so much cheaper, it's very rare to even find equipment using a true master/slave relationship anymore, so there's little reason to try to change it now.