Hacker News Reader

Comment by ng12 | Hacker News Reader

I think it's important to note that master has no relation to master/slave. It's master as in master copy or master key.

View on HN

Doesn't it come from Bitkeeper?

See https://github.com/bitkeeper-scm/bitkeeper/blob/master/doc/H... for master/slave terminology.

You are mistaken. The terminology came from BitKeeper, which did use the terms in the sense of master and slave repositories: https://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2019-May/...

In any case, the git dev responsible for the choice has made their views known: https://twitter.com/xpasky/status/1271477451756056577

The git dev responsible for the choice has said it had nothing to do with master/slave:

> "master" as in e.g. "master recording". Perhaps you could say the original, but viewed from the production process perspective.

> A clueless Central European youngster whose command of English was mostly illusory came up with the term, which is why it isn't very obvious...

https://twitter.com/xpasky/status/1272280760280637441?s=20

I always thought it meant "master copy"...

There's a lot of people involved saying otherwise: https://public-inbox.org/git/20200504174548.r3zaftqcq52yhd2u...

I'm going to need a source for that. I can't find any reference to slave in Bitkeeper documentation.

Not true. BitKeeper, which git was modeled after, which used the "master" and "slave" branch terminology.

The strategy here is to pick things that cannot defend themselves like words and statues and attack them. If an impact is achieved, you can declare victory, use it for recruiting, etc.

"No relation" is wrong since it is the same word.

Like how "fluke" as in parasite and "fluke" as in tail lobe are the same word?

If you are curious you can look it up in an etymological dictionary.

I was asking a rhetorical question.

Apparently, nobody here understands that.

Read; read. Bail; bail. Ride; ride. Cap; cap. Tap; tap. The list goes on. English is full of words with totally different meanings but the same spelling.

You are thinking of homonyms.

You might be right. You could argue Master does have a homonym, as "Authority over thing" comes from Latin origins in "magister" while "Full proficiency at a skill" comes from the French "maistre". But they more or less came to mean the same thing in English. To say someone has "Authority over a skill" embodies the meaning of both at once as an example.

Digging into the usage of Master for "Master Copy" you could say the intention is that the master copy has authority, or highest standing, over all other copies, so more or less the meaning they were trying to avoid.

Words can mean totally different things. Contextually, they are unrelated.

Master: "Someone who has control over something or someone. ... (engineering, computing) A device that is controlling other devices or is an authoritative source. "

They are not unrelated. I'm not making an argument whether the word is inappropriate or not. Just pointing out an etymological fact.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com