Possibly controversial: using `main` rather than `master` for github branches

Not mission-critical, but worth noting that from all the projects I do regularly contribute, Bitwarden is one of the few that still uses master for its main branch. While this topic can often devolve into meta-discussions about the validity around the whole idea of master being some kind of loaded term…just thought I’d throw this out there. Feel free to close the issue if it does end up devolving beyond any useful discussion.

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hey @patrickhlauke, thanks for the nudge! I’ll check in with the team on this one :+1:t2:

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the world is collapsing but people have no other problems than this… crazy world…

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but still, you found the time to comment here…

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As a noob dev, just curious: why would it be good practice to call it main instead of master? I’ve noticed that whenever I initialize a git repo locally, it automatically calls it master too. Whereas Github defaults to main.

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It is not wrong to use the term master, but some believe that we could easily avoid such terms when perfectly fine substitutes already exist. A good article about the rationale can be found here:

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Git is also in the process of making this change, but is phasing it in gradually. You can read more about this in their statement here:

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I don’t have immediate plans to contribute, nor does it affect my decision to contribute in the future, but I would appreciate a switch to main over master.

It’s objectively not a bad thing to do, even if you think the term master in computer science is benign. The only downside I can think of is git log oddities, but even then I feel like an experienced enough git wizard could sort those out with ease.

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In Git, “main” or “master” is a naming convention for a branch. After cloning (downloading) a project from a remote server, the resulting local repository has a single local branch: the so-called “main” or “master” branch. This means that “main” or “master” can be seen as a repository’s “default” branch.

Hello guys,

I would like to problematize this issue here with some arguments and points of view, I hope that some people will contribute here too.

From what I researched, the words main and master have the same meaning, they are synonymous. Why don’t we use the term important instead of master, main?

Both the terms master and main have the same meaning

no, they don’t. the fact that you can’t work out that “master” (versus “slave”) has connotations that “main” doesn’t, tells me you don’t actually understand the point of this request. but thanks for playing along.

i’ll be honest, I’m really not interested anymore in the various typical excuses i see here from the usual tone-deaf developers that seem so adamant that the term is ok, actually. @bw-admin … either do this, or please just close this issue because i cannot be arsed to read the usual apologetics from people

Sorry, but I’m trying to understand what’s going on. @dh024 said that we can think of new terms… I think it would be more interesting to use the term “important”. @bw-admin Am I wrong in asking that the term important be better than the term main, master?

I just said that we should vote for new words that are more suitable. For me, every branch of some main repository is an important branch.

‘main’ is the naming nomenclature that github itself has chosen to use now. when you create a new repository, the default branch will be called ‘main’.

‘main’ also has meaning that ‘important’ does not. think for a moment about a tv show. if someone says a character is an ‘important’ character in the show vs the ‘main’ character in the show… you get a totally different impression of the significance of the character.

lastly, i have not once seen any significant project name their repository’s default branch ‘important’ and there are exactly zero reasons to use a non-standard nomenclature in this case when ‘main’ is absolutely appropriate and already standardized in practice, imho.

Closing this now as it is a very straightforward request and it seems that everything has been said that needs to be said. Tagging @sj-bitwarden and @JaiBitwarden here to bring this to the attention of the dev team, since @bw-admin (dwbitw) has since moved on to other duties.

Hi everyone - I just wanted to share some good news that this has been completed!

All branches previously named master have been renamed to main. :raised_hands: