Hi Junio, On Fri, 12 Jun 2020, Junio C Hamano wrote: > Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@xxxxxx> writes: > > > I added a _brief_ extension to the context to the first commit's commit > > message. However, I do not want to go into details here because _this_ > > patch series is only about empowering users to change their default main > > branch name. > > Sensible. > > And I do not think the planned follow-up work to rename 'master' to > something else needs to be defended with lengthy history lessons. Yes, I agree. It is probably sufficient to just point at a couple high-profile projects that already made the switch to `main`. > Sufficiently large part of the user population are unhappy with the > use of the word 'master' as the default name of the primary branch > in a newly created repository, and the mere fact that we are aware > of that is good enough justification to move _away_ from 'master'. Yes, even Pasky says he regrets the choice of term (see https://twitter.com/xpasky/status/1271477451756056577): I picked the names "master" (and "origin") in the early Git tooling back in 2005. (this probably means you shouldn't give much weight to my name preferences :) ) I have wished many times I would have named them "main" (and "upstream") instead. > In other words, we do not have to explain why 'master' was bad, as > it does not have to be bad for everybody to be replaced. > > But you need to defend that the new word you picked is something > everybody is happy with. That is much harder ;-). To be honest, I stopped looking for got arguments in favor of one name after a couple days, and instead focused on the consensus I saw: Chrome [*1*] and node.js [*2*] apparently stated publicly that they want to change their main branches to `main`, and GitLab [*3*] and GitHub [*4*] seem to intend to change the default for new repositories accordingly. It is not like we have to decide for the community (as we did back in 2005). I am actually quite relieved about that. Ciao, Dscho URL *1*: https://twitter.com/Una/status/1271180494944829441 URL *2*: https://github.com/nodejs/node/issues/33864 URL *3*: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/issues/221164 URL *4*: https://twitter.com/natfriedman/status/1271253144442253312 (this is not really a public announcement, I agree, but it is a public Tweet by the CEO)
