Rename master branch

Update

Since this has gained traction recently, we wanted to update it to share that we chose development as our default branch name because it reflects the way we work more accurately. However, we don’t think it’s a good universal default branch name. main would likely be a better choice if you’re planning to rename master (unless there’s a more descriptive name you’d like to use that better reflects the way your team works).

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Summary

I’d like to rename the branch master to development and use that going forward for our work.

From Problematic Terminology in Open-Source on master/slave terminology in software:

Use of this term is problematic. It references slavery to convey meaning about the relationship between two entities.

Removing this terminology from our workflow is a small gesture to include more people from marginalized groups in this project.

(I’m open to names other than development, though I do think it’s a good fit for us now that we are in the practice of using release branches.)

Technical Steps

• create development branch from master
• make development the default GitHub branch
• modify github/central to use development for release notes reloading
• redirect PRs to development in desktop/desktop
• move branch protections from master to development
• modify docs to reference development instead of master
• delete master branch to avoid confusion?

(Thanks to @gr2m for prior thinking on this process)

Related Issues and Projects

• https://github.com/django/django/pull/2692
• https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/COUCHDB-2248
• https://www.drupal.org/node/2275877
• https://github.com/antirez/redis/issues/3185
• https://bugs.python.org/issue34605
• https://github.com/gr2m/octokit-rename-branch

[outofambit]

all done! ✨

[shiftkey]

In my head I’d always taken “master” to be borrowed from the concept of “master copy”. I wanted to see if the Git contributors ever documented it somewhere but I couldn’t find an early Git commit that mentions why master was chosen in that very first version. Maybe there’s a mailing list thread, but at this point it’s archaeological (Git is almost 14 years old since that first very first commit was created) and it’s for my curiosity more than anything.

So let’s do it.

I’m 👍 on the rename for few other reasons:

• words have meaning, and need to be appreciated in a wider context than “it’s just code”
• good names have value, and if there’s a name that better describes what the default branch represents to us we should use it
• by using a different branch to master for the desktop repository we’re also developing and testing that GitHub Desktop has no leftover assumptions about the presence of a master branch

(I’m open to names other than development, though I do think it’s a good fit for us now that we are in the practice of using release branches.)

This is a chance for us to think about what the default branch represents - if it’s going to be the latest, bleeding-edge code then the name should reflect that.

I’m 👍 to development or even dev to save some keystrokes, but I’ll let others chime in if they’ve got bright ideas.