Github says it will replace the terms whitelist, blacklist, and master/slave for being...

[midian182]

A hot potato: Days after it was reported that more tech companies and insiders were calling for racially insensitive terms such as whitelist, blacklist, and master/slave to be replaced, Github has revealed it would be removing these words from its service.

Github CEO Nat Friedman said the firm was working to replace the terms ‘master’ and ‘slave’ with the likes of ‘main/default/primary’ and ‘secondary.’ Users will also find ‘blacklist’ and ‘whitelist’ dropped for ‘allow list’ and ‘deny/exclude list,’ writes ZDNet.

The announcement came soon after reports of renewed calls to drop the long-used tech terms following the death of George Floyd and the subsequent Black Lives Matter protests.

White hat and black hat, names for ethical hackers and those who hack for personal gain, respectively, have also faced calls to be replaced with “ethical” and “unethical.”

Security community! Can we please agree on what terms we're using instead of "whitelist" and "blacklist"? ? It would be great to make these consistent.

— Maya Kaczorowski (@MayaKaczorowski) June 11, 2020

It’s not just recent events that have thrown the terms under the spotlight. They were banned by the UK’s National Cyber Security Center (NCSC) following a customer complaint back in May, and Chromium depreciated the terms after a request to do so by Microsoft. We also saw Drupal remove Master/Slave in 2014, while Python did the same in 2018.

Elsewhere, the Android Open Source Project (AOSP), the Go programming language, the PHPUnit library, editing service Grammarly, and the Curl file download utility have all stated their intention to replace whitelist and blacklist.

It's a great idea and we are already working on this! cc @billygriffin22

— Nat Friedman (@natfriedman) June 12, 2020

ZDNet reports that LinkedIn and Apple engineers are trying to get their companies to also drop the terms. Most people are for the change, saying the terminology is racially insensitive and outdated, but others argue that switching them will cause technical problems for programmers, and that other actions, such as donating to BLM causes, would be more beneficial.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/85631-github-replace-terms-whitelist-blacklist-masterslave-racially-insensitive.html

 

[bviktor]

Protest votes. This is one of the reasons why people like Trump get elected. Nice going, folks, keep up with the madness.

 

[Vulcanproject]

Pure woke nonsense. Ban hysterical and 'no can do' while you're at it.

Hall and Oates need censoring and taking off every playlist everywhere for 'no can do'. Look up the etymology.

 

[veLa]

I get where they're coming from, a politically correct appease everyone stance, but that doesn't mean I agree at all.

I always considered IT to be a politics free zone. Should I be apologizing to my old secondary IDE hard drive for setting its jumper to slave? No. That's pure nonsense.

 

[yRaz]

I have a feeling this is going to cause problems with legacy support for decades to come.

 

[jbc029]

If it's no longer factually correct to say something is a slave drive, that's fine. But that was the point of calling it a slave drive. A drive that cannot function without the master. It, in its current configuration, is a slave.

Anthropomorphizing a hard drive isn't helping address high poverty or over-incarceration.

For what it is and how it works, in the context of IT hardware, master/slave is accurate.

 

[m4a4]

Congrats Github for planning to change something that wasn't racist in the first place. The most amusing thing for me right now is that it looks like they're adding another syllable to the words (we all know we're lazier than that) lol

 

[franticfrosty]

Does this mean I won't be able to pick the color black anymore because it'll be racially insensitive?, Wait until these jokers figure out comedy is where you're laughing at someone, they'll have a field day.

What's next, Monitors with rainbow colors on the bezel because having a black bezel is racially insensitive. I swear its april 1st and we're all being tricked by the tech giants changing our clocks.

 

[psycros]

Meanwhile in Moscow and Beijing they pop the champagne corks as America turns over the reigns of power to autistic lunatics. They'll be laughing right up until President Apache Helicopter decides that their countries need some "sensitivity".

 

[Lew Zealand]

Anyone got some stats on whether Chess Grandmasters prefer black to white pieces? I forget who moves first in chess, the only thing I really know about is that I lose.

At least checkers is sensible, black vs. red. No white at all.

 

[viperfl]

The mentality behind this is just so over the top. Why don't we ban the colors white and black? Why don't we ban anything made from cotten? Let's just burn every house down that was built during the 1800's.

Totally whacked out

 

[Neatfeatguy]

Yeah for letting the retards run the world!

 

[EClyde]

I vote to add..."What just happened", "Why it Matters" and all the rest

 

[Bullwinkle M]

Protest votes. This is one of the reasons why people like Trump get elected. Nice going, folks, keep up with the madness.

Trump was never elected

The majority refused to vote for Trump or Hillary

But they're not listening!

Of those who did vote, the majority voted for Hillary

But they're not listening!

The next election will be the same

So, now who's listening?

 

[stewi0001]

I'd better start getting offended whenever the color red is used in a way I don't like! XD

 

[cuerdc]

History books are going to start looking like confidential files with blacked out parts. ?

 

[p51d007]

Who didn't see THAT coming!
That CHAZ/CHOP place up in Washington state needs to be renamed DUMP.
Dumb
Uneducated
Moronic
People

 

[jackal2687]

Call me crazy, I refuse to change the terminology for people that require a safe space to function.

 

[AnalyticalNerd]

Language that had no negative meaning originally is being attacked by the radicals that find a problem with every single tiny thing and try to shape the world in their image. Maybe the president they detest so much wouldn't have been elected had they focused on things that would guarantee actual change instead of freaking out and falling back on trying to make innocent words look racist and crediting themselves with "change" when they blackmail companies into changing the terms under the guise, " omg that company is using an innocent word that we deem racist. Unleash the twitter horde BLM! BLM! ". TLDR if you want to stop racism do things that will actually change things like voting for a new leader instead of freaking out about an innocent word.

 

[AnalyticalNerd]

Oh no blacking out things redacted parts of files are racist. I guess we'd better not do it.

 

[Jeneli]

when they blackmail

I think you meant coercemail. /s

 

[forechan]

Give me a f_cking break!! Good grief.

 

[EClyde]

Trump was never elected

The majority refused to vote for Trump or Hillary

But they're not listening!

Of those who did vote, the majority voted for Hillary

But they're not listening!

The next election will be the same

So, now who's listening?

The Majority in this country does not elect the President. The Founders KNEW what they were about. Start listening!

 

[EClyde]

Language that had no negative meaning originally is being attacked by the radicals that find a problem with every single tiny thing and try to shape the world in their image. Maybe the president they detest so much wouldn't have been elected had they focused on things that would guarantee actual change instead of freaking out and falling back on trying to make innocent words look racist and crediting themselves with "change" when they blackmail companies into changing the terms under the guise, " omg that company is using an innocent word that we deem racist. Unleash the twitter horde BLM! BLM! ". TLDR if you want to stop racism do things that will actually change things like voting for a new leader instead of freaking out about an innocent word.

Which is why they must be so thoroughly defeated they never rise

 

[kimo1]

But what about yellow? When will #AsianLivesMatter? What about rest of the world, of which many were also slaves at some point in history? When will their lives matter?