Ask HN: Less culturally loaded terms for “Master/Slave”“ | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Less culturally loaded terms for “Master/Slave”“

8 pointsjascii26 comments

I'd like to move us away from those terms and would love to hear from others what terms they have come up with. There is "primary/secondary" but it seems long and doesn't type nicely. What ya got?

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Leader/Follower (pietroglyph's is probably best), Cam/Follower, Sender/Receiver, Drive/Pulley (?), Reference/Replica, Model/Instance, Broker/Agent, Supervisor/Worker, maybe even Coordinator/Helper (these are a bit long), Lead/Rhythm, Lead/Understudy, Boss/Worker

Also good but maybe weird: Alpha/Beta, Red/Black (and if we need 3+, I think Hearts/Spades/Clubs[/Diamonds[/Jokers..]] is fine if you write down the object of the game, so to speak)

Slightly humorous but not best: Hivemind/Drone, Hypnotoad/Zombie, Sauron/Saruman, Don/Capo, Drummer/Dancer

Switching away from problematic terminology is also a good opportunity to make it more accurate and specific.

In some situations it's "process A allows writes, process B only allow reads", in which case "writer/reader" maybe?

In other situation it's "process A is in control, but process B will take control if process A fails". In which case "controller/fallback", maybe?

It depends if you're talking about replicated databases, flip flops, hydraulics, or something else. (I'm currently writing about flip flops, so I'm interested in terminology for that case.)

Wikipedia has some suggestions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master/slave_(technology)#Term... Also see the HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17954823

What exactly is wrong with using master/slave?

You know, what's funny is that it probably would stop being culturally loaded if people stopped giving special treatment to words like these, trying to avoid them.

I imagine that OP is making reference to African American enslavement in US history, but I wouldn't even consider this relation if it weren't for this post.

I have the same question regarding "Scrum Master". Obviously nobody is explicitly calling the team members "slaves" but it's still not a good look.

What, we can't even use "master" as a way to describe a really skilled person anymore?

That's not how I hear it - is the Scrum Master just someone who's really skilled at Scrum?

Someone who has mastered or became really skilled at Scrum could be described as a Scrum Master yes. Or in another instance, he who has mastered the art of baiting, is the Master Baiter.

If a martial arts teacher is referred to as "master" by their students, does that infer that they are slaves?

I guess not. I suppose I have more respect for a martial arts teacher than a scrum master.

Can you cite any instance of these terms actually being problematic in practice? This is usually a political statement dressed in concern troll clothing.

Just asking what alternatives others have come up with because we would like to use something different. I'm not really interested in having an in-depth discussion as to why at the moment. But thanks for your input.

I tried various alternatives (daimyo/peasant), but after using them for a while I realized they had similar connotations.

lord/serf

Hmm, not sure I'd call that less culturally loaded..

I ended up going with `-prim` and `-sec` which seemed reasonably self-descriptive.

I had a manager who was big into amateur dramatics so I used Director/Actor.

I’ve seen leader and follower on some motor controllers that I’ve used.

Write (master), wo / replica, reader, ro

Active/fallback?

Parent and child.

government/citizen

worker/manager?

zed/gimp

a/b

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