Re: language cleanups in code and docs

On Tue, 2020-06-16 at 19:55 -0400, Tom Lane wrote:
> Andrew Dunstan <andrew(dot)dunstan(at)2ndquadrant(dot)com> writes:
> > On 6/15/20 2:22 PM, Andres Freund wrote:
> > > 2) 'master' as a reference to the branch. Personally I be in favor of
> > > changing the branch name, but it seems like it'd be better done as a
> > > somewhat separate discussion to me, as it affects development
> > > practices to some degree.
> > I'm OK with this, but I would need plenty of notice to get the buildfarm
> > adjusted.
>
> "master" is the default branch name established by git, is it not? Not
> something we picked. I don't feel like we need to be out front of the
> rest of the world in changing that. It'd be a cheaper change than some of
> the other proposals in this thread, no doubt, but it would still create
> confusion for new hackers who are used to the standard git convention.

I have the feeling that all this is going somewhat too far.

I feel fine with removing the term "slave", even though I have no qualms
about enslaving machines.

But the term "master" is not restricted to slavery. It can just as well
imply expert knowledge (think academic degree), and it can denote someone
with the authority to command (there is nothing wrong with "servant", right?
Or do we have to abolish the term "server" too?).

I appreciate that other people's sensitivities might be different, and I
don't want to start a fight over it. But renaming things makes the code
history harder to read, so it should be used with moderation.

Yours,
Laurenz Albe