If "Master/Slave" terminology in computing sounds bad now, why not change it to "Dom/Sub"?

Someonelol@lemmy.dbzer0.com to Showerthoughts@lemmy.world – 609 points –

It sounds way less offensive to those who decry the original terminology's problematic roots but still keeps its meaning intact.

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y'all I understand there are larger issues in the world but please let's not pretend that POC working in tech feel awesome about typing master/slave in the terminal, it's outdated and should be changed.

I'm white and I don't feel comfortable saying it/typing it. It's antiquated and weird.

But POC are not the only ones that have been enslaved.

Pretty much all races and people have been enslaved in history.

Slave does not equal North American POC slave and the term in this context has absolutely nothing to do with them. The only time it refers specifically to them is when discussing North American history (and maybe current history due to the fact that USA still enslaves people in prison)

One might argue that the term is outdated because slaves are less common these days, but it has nothing to do with POC (or human slaves at all). But I won't argue that because the term is very easy to understand and thus not outdated.

North American, more specifically US slavery is very recent relative to the rest of history and was deeply ingrained into the economy of half the United States. War broke out to abolish it and the effects of it are still felt today.

Pretty much all races and people have been enslaved in history.

Don't deflect from the racism, discrimination, and prejudice that black Americans still experience to this day because of slavery.

Maybe but the terms slave and master have nothing to do with that.

Don’t deflect from the racism, discrimination, and prejudice that black Americans still experience to this day because of slavery.

hate to be that guy but like, i feel like we should probably push for more POC to enter CS education fields, or like, improve the socioeconomic status of them, or like, crack down on discriminatory hiring practices, before we like. Start removing words because they feel moderately icky and make my skin crawl.

Why not both? We have the capacity to replace outdated/useless words and make the situation better for others. In fact, one does not prevent the other whatsoever

that's also true. But seeing as this is a discussion primarily about removing terms from common parlance, i think it's reasonable to focus on solely that aspect.

Ultimately, i'm just not really convinced that doing this is going to be ultimately productive at the end of the day. I might be wrong i suppose. But i think i'd need to see some supporting data first.

That's a cool story, bro.

Completely irrelevant to the observation that descendents of slaves probably dont appreciate the terminology.

probably dont appreciate the terminology.

Exactly

It's a weird phrase to begin with.

In law, the phrase "master / servant" has been around forever. It's the foundation of the law of agency.

Some tech bro picked slave instead of servant.

Not just that, it's bad and makes no sense in its technical context.

Server client is far better.

No, that's completely dependent on what you are referring too. I have never heard anyone ever referring to a server as "master" or a client as a "slave". The slave/master terminology is often used for storage. I.E. Master drive and slave drive.

Nowadays its more ofte used for server hierarchies/functionality. Or well, a lot of software is changing now. Mariadb use Source and replica.

You are correct I swapped client with other such as worker, child, and helper,

Master–slave (technology)

In 2018, after a heated debate, developers of Python replaced the term. Python switched to main, parent, and server; and worker, child, and helper, depending on context.

The Linux kernel adopted a similar policy to use more specific terms in new code and documentation.

My problem with the term "slave" is that it does not indicate there is a delegation of work going, on but rather that the subdevice is somehow fully "owned" by the master device. Whereas in reality the master is more like a manager telling a worker what to do.

In some cases the sub device is pretty much owned by the "master" device.

I'm mostly thinking of IDE since that's the only place I ever hear anyone use master/slave except GIT where master is used.

that's because the server is rarely the master, the clients do work, and the server just exchanges the work of the clients, it's a lot more akin to a telephone exchange as opposed to a master/slave architecture.

The fact that you write POC instead of "black people" shows how ridiculous this whole conversation is.

Is asked the local POC (Indonesian-Japanese; Indonesian-born) and he responded (and I quote) "people need to stop being pussies". The Brazilians (Brazil mentioned!) didn't care much either.

So I don't need to pretend anything about anything.

Your milage may vary though.

are you a person of color yourself? Or are you white like the statistical majority of us?

Shitposting aside, i feel like if you feel weird typing it out, you probably care too much about most things in life, though then again, i'm pretty fucking autistic so.