Linux Sound Subsystem Begins Cleaning Up Its Terminology To Meet Inclusive Guidelines

[Djhg2000]

If you knew my Dad you wouldn't have that point of view. Long story short, prison mentality. To put it another way, my USMC Drill Instructors don't have shit on my Dad's ability to yell and say some nasty, mean stuff.

Basically, what one says when they're yelling matters. For example: "Get the fuck out of here with that bullshit" is a bit different than "Damn you are one stupid fuck. Get out of here with that, that, that gibberish that makes Forrest Gump seem like Einstein. Did your Mom drop you on your head for the fun of it? Seriously, get the fuck out of here with that bullshit."

We're talking in the context of Linus rants here, but yes the contents, timing and intentions behind of the yelling does of course matter.

[oiaohm]

Master and slave are actually being used in the proper context though. The master dictates what the slaves should do. It's frequently used in hardware because it's a very robust way to structure control logic; no two slaves can go behind the back of the master and cause hardware glitches.

This is where problems start that is not the only define of master slave used in hardware

To explain further, let's look at I2C. I2C is a master/slave protocol where the master handles the data clock and clocks in and out data from what can be thought of as a virtual memory map.

Except what you have just written here is for I2C context. You do get other buses using master slave term where the slave can raise a IRQ and at time use it own clock for transferring data these can still be a master/slave bus. Think of the database usage of master and slave as well where the slave is allowed to start a transaction with master because slave has a request the slave need to service and the information it needs is only on the master. Master/slave relationship does not mean that the master is 100 percent in control all the time.

CAN bus by documentation is Multi master and fun part they have peripherals that are basically the CAN bus name for slaves.

Really Master/Slave all the cases where it used in the kernel you need to know context to be exactly sure of what Master/Slave means. Lot of the suggested alternatives to Master/Slave have the same problem where there meaning changes with context. I don't know if master/slave term usage is properly fixable. Its not like blacklist/whitelist where the other terms make it 100 percent clear no matter the context where blacklist/whitelist could be effected by person own context. If there are terms other than master/slave that can be used instead of master/slave that remove context from being required to understand exactly what it means it will be better.

Lot of the words sets that are not that classed as neutral language have horrible broad defines on that ground alone we should consider replacing them if there is something less broad and more exact so less effected by context.

I am not saying finding the correct words will be easy. Linux kernel does not have lots of pro technical writers. Yes your pro technical writers are meant to be like master of terms and correct terms developers use to be more exact to other developers to reduce confusion. Pro technical writers is something the Linux kernel development is badly lacking. Maybe these terms would not have been used as much if we had more of pro technical writers looking at the source.

[skeevy420]

This is where problems start that is not the only define of master slave used in hardware




Except what you have just written here is for I2C context. You do get other buses using master slave term where the slave can raise a IRQ and at time use it own clock for transferring data these can still be a master/slave bus. Think of the database usage of master and slave as well where the slave is allowed to start a transaction with master because slave has a request the slave need to service and the information it needs is only on the master. Master/slave relationship does not mean that the master is 100 percent in control all the time.

CAN bus by documentation is Multi master and fun part they have peripherals that are basically the CAN bus name for slaves.

Really Master/Slave all the cases where it used in the kernel you need to know context to be exactly sure of what Master/Slave means. Lot of the suggested alternatives to Master/Slave have the same problem where there meaning changes with context. I don't know if master/slave term usage is properly fixable. Its not like blacklist/whitelist where the other terms make it 100 percent clear no matter the context where blacklist/whitelist could be effected by person own context. If there are terms other than master/slave that can be used instead of master/slave that remove context from being required to understand exactly what it means it will be better.

Lot of the words sets that are not that classed as neutral language have horrible broad defines on that ground alone we should consider replacing them if there is something less broad and more exact so less effected by context.

I am not saying finding the correct words will be easy. Linux kernel does not have lots of pro technical writers. Yes your pro technical writers are meant to be like master of terms and correct terms developers use to be more exact to other developers to reduce confusion. Pro technical writers is something the Linux kernel development is badly lacking. Maybe these terms would not have been used as much if we had more of pro technical writers looking at the source.

Primary, secondary, tertiary, quaternary, quinary, senary, septenary, octonary, nonary, and denary.

Welp, that wasn't hard at all.

[Djhg2000]

This is where problems start that is not the only define of master slave used in hardware




Except what you have just written here is for I2C context. You do get other buses using master slave term where the slave can raise a IRQ and at time use it own clock for transferring data these can still be a master/slave bus. Think of the database usage of master and slave as well where the slave is allowed to start a transaction with master because slave has a request the slave need to service and the information it needs is only on the master. Master/slave relationship does not mean that the master is 100 percent in control all the time.

CAN bus by documentation is Multi master and fun part they have peripherals that are basically the CAN bus name for slaves.

Really Master/Slave all the cases where it used in the kernel you need to know context to be exactly sure of what Master/Slave means. Lot of the suggested alternatives to Master/Slave have the same problem where there meaning changes with context. I don't know if master/slave term usage is properly fixable. Its not like blacklist/whitelist where the other terms make it 100 percent clear no matter the context where blacklist/whitelist could be effected by person own context. If there are terms other than master/slave that can be used instead of master/slave that remove context from being required to understand exactly what it means it will be better.

Lot of the words sets that are not that classed as neutral language have horrible broad defines on that ground alone we should consider replacing them if there is something less broad and more exact so less effected by context.

I am not saying finding the correct words will be easy. Linux kernel does not have lots of pro technical writers. Yes your pro technical writers are meant to be like master of terms and correct terms developers use to be more exact to other developers to reduce confusion. Pro technical writers is something the Linux kernel development is badly lacking. Maybe these terms would not have been used as much if we had more of pro technical writers looking at the source.

I just picked I2C because it was a clear example, not because it was supposed to define the boundaries of what master/slave means. Master/slave is simply a way to describe which one is in control of the assigned slaves and which are doing some work for the assigned master. The definition might get fuzzy at times but the terms are still there to describe the idea of how different independent parts are supposed to work together.

You can argue that there are more accurate alternatives in specific cases, I have no problem with clarifying how code logic is supposed to work and I'd welcome better terms where they fit. What I take issue with are the attempts by some people at somehow connecting master/slave in both software and hardware with human slavery.

[Djhg2000]

Primary, secondary, tertiary, quaternary, quinary, senary, septenary, octonary, nonary, and denary.

Welp, that wasn't hard at all.

"-Yeah just set up another primary to manage the secondary secondaries on the bus.
-But what about the auxiliary temperature sensor?
-You can just put that on another secondary, it's a tertiary function anyway."

Not confusing at all.

[oiaohm]

Primary, secondary, tertiary, quaternary, quinary, senary, septenary, octonary, nonary, and denary.

Welp, that wasn't hard at all.

And if you take i2c as example that naming does not fit. Requester/Responder for I2C could be closer than Master/Slave for describing how I2C works. Master in I2C is always doing requests so for that Requester does fit better and the slave in I2C only responds to what Master/Requester does so more aligned to Responder. I am not going to say that is the exact right pair of words. But due to how generic Master/Slave is every where it is used it does really need to be looked at if it really providing useful level of description or if something else is better.

The definition might get fuzzy at times but the terms are still there to describe the idea of how different independent parts are supposed to work together.

You also have to consider with terms we have be insanely lazy with Master/Slave as it been fairly much we have the term Master/Slave we are done has happened in a lot of protocols instead of looking at other terms that could describe what is happening better.

You can argue that there are more accurate alternatives in specific cases, I have no problem with clarifying how code logic is supposed to work and I'd welcome better terms where they fit. What I take issue with are the attempts by some people at somehow connecting master/slave in both software and hardware with human slavery.

The bad news there is some truth to the over usage of the term Master/Slave in software and the link to human slavery. Its fairly much the if you have only a hammer everything begins looking like a nail including screws and bolts. Most people were taught about Master/Slave terms in history classes as in to human slavery. Requester/Responder did those words appear anywhere in your school education? If Requester/Responder did appear not in the common classes everyone would have done.

I am not for Master/Slave terms to be banned out right but we should look at where they are used because we have had a terminology bias leading to over usage including cases where Master/Slave does not fit well. We can fairly much bet there will be other terms over used in the Linux kernel that have some early education bias that are not linked to anything offensive as well but are also not as descriptive as what they should be.

Blacklist/Whitelist computer world usage does not come from slavery but its equally as stupid why it been used because its not descriptive at all really. Blacklist/Whitelist comes from the wild west trope of the guy in the white hat being the good guy and the guy in the black hat being the bad guy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_...bolism_in_film Yes people have researched that trope turns out the White hat comes from white wedding dress? and black was because film was black and white so black gave the most contrast. Note I question marked the white wedding dress there is a horrible one its a white hat because the film was black and white the traditional wedding America wedding dress when that started was light red and white was the closest that would display on film so we could have end up with Blacklist and Redlist if wild west movies had started on color film. So blacklist/whitelist in the computer world comes from a stupid movie trope that by luck it end up as black/white. Yes that trope includes the grey hat that leads greylist(less used).

Of course accountancy and other places use blacklist and whitelist/Redlist in inverted meaning before holly-wood does the trope. The accountancy reason is also equally stupid black writing tools was cheaper than colour so the one you will be writing the most you put in the cheapest colour and you hope to be writing good outcomes more. So if computer world had started from accountancy not movie trope on blacklist/whitelist meaning would have always been the other way over and still totally not descriptive.

Lack of professional technology writers is a big problem for the Linux kernel and may other open source projects. Coding developers normally don't have the best human language skills and that where good technical writers come in with higher than average human language skills who should have the skills to suggest the best terms. Yes the lack of profession technology writers and the lack of will to invest in them leads us to tropes and random selection of words from school classes being source we call computer terminology instead of the best words to describe. Computer terminology not the only field terminology with this problem either.

Really I wish this language correction was having nothing to-do with being "Inclusive Terminology" instead just be a simple admit to ourselves we have been insanely lazy with our usage and creation of terminology and have got into habit of using poorly describing terminology that we really need to fix. Yes different people will fight to keep the poor describing terminology not because they bias but change in terminology means they will have to learn something different human nature to resist change. This is why its better if you can with terminology to invest time in money at the start getting it right than having to correct it latter.

[nadro]

I don't understand your issue clearly regarding more than 2 tracks in the project. JACK and Pulseaudio can be used together though through several methods. On my desktop I'm using multiple sound-cards, but I have an HP laptop where they work together fine.
In my video I detail how to use Pulseaudio's JACK modules. Basically JACK takes over the audio-interface, and through pavucontrol (Pulseaudio Volume Control) you simply direct Firefox/Chrome/VLC's output to the JACK Sinks/Sources.
I hope my video is helpful: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NxWtDSa-RQ

I mean that if I have two tracks in Audacity project and I try to start recording at the end of second track, a recording just freeze (I saw this on 3 different PC) and regardless if I used ALSA or PulseAudio in Audacity settings. Thanks a lot about link and info about pavucontrol. Today I'll try to setup my environment.

[Djhg2000]

You also have to consider with terms we have be insanely lazy with Master/Slave as it been fairly much we have the term Master/Slave we are done has happened in a lot of protocols instead of looking at other terms that could describe what is happening better.

We might have been lazy with the terms but master/slave is still a very simple way of coordinating independent logic. The concept isn't going anywhere soon and so neither should the terms themselves when used accurately. What I'm saying is that we can't eradicate words just because of potential connections to the past.

The bad news there is some truth to the over usage of the term Master/Slave in software and the link to human slavery. Its fairly much the if you have only a hammer everything begins looking like a nail including screws and bolts. Most people were taught about Master/Slave terms in history classes as in to human slavery. Requester/Responder did those words appear anywhere in your school education? If Requester/Responder did appear not in the common classes everyone would have done.

But conversely, if all you can associate master/slave with is human slavery then every instance of either word will seem offensive to you. It's an equally ridiculous situation. The solution isn't to avoid the terms, it's to make sure they're used properly with whatever qualifiers are necessary to establish the context. Avoiding the terms is only going to further the problem by making sure the terms only appear in the context of human slavery.

I am not for Master/Slave terms to be banned out right but we should look at where they are used because we have had a terminology bias leading to over usage including cases where Master/Slave does not fit well. We can fairly much bet there will be other terms over used in the Linux kernel that have some early education bias that are not linked to anything offensive as well but are also not as descriptive as what they should be.

Again, I'm not against replacing inaccurate terms with better ones, but there's inevitably going to be cases where master/slave are the proper and accurate terms to describe the code.

Blacklist/Whitelist computer world usage does not come from slavery but its equally as stupid why it been used because its not descriptive at all really. Blacklist/Whitelist comes from the wild west trope of the guy in the white hat being the good guy and the guy in the black hat being the bad guy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_...bolism_in_film Yes people have researched that trope turns out the White hat comes from white wedding dress? and black was because film was black and white so black gave the most contrast. Note I question marked the white wedding dress there is a horrible one its a white hat because the film was black and white the traditional wedding America wedding dress when that started was light red and white was the closest that would display on film so we could have end up with Blacklist and Redlist if wild west movies had started on color film. So blacklist/whitelist in the computer world comes from a stupid movie trope that by luck it end up as black/white. Yes that trope includes the grey hat that leads greylist(less used).

That's clearly not true. Even Wikipedia quotes the use of the term blacklist in the 1639 play "The Unnatural Combat", way before the period of 1850-1910 usually referred to as "The Wild West".

That's not the first instance of using black for negative and white for positive either, nor is it the only one. The first documented use of a white flag to indicate surrender (positive intentions) was from AD 109, while the black flag was first used in 1524 as a symbol of revolt (negative intentions).

There are more modern examples as well; in DC wiring black is used to indicate the negative conductor while red and other colors indicates the positive conductor(s), in US AC wiring the black conductor indicates line (the one that kills you) while the white one indicates neutral (the one that doesn't kill you).

If anything red is the ambiguous color.

Of course accountancy and other places use blacklist and whitelist/Redlist in inverted meaning before holly-wood does the trope. The accountancy reason is also equally stupid black writing tools was cheaper than colour so the one you will be writing the most you put in the cheapest colour and you hope to be writing good outcomes more. So if computer world had started from accountancy not movie trope on blacklist/whitelist meaning would have always been the other way over and still totally not descriptive.

There's also no practical way of using white lettering on white paper. Same reason bright papyri was written on with dark reed pens.

Lack of professional technology writers is a big problem for the Linux kernel and may other open source projects. Coding developers normally don't have the best human language skills and that where good technical writers come in with higher than average human language skills who should have the skills to suggest the best terms. Yes the lack of profession technology writers and the lack of will to invest in them leads us to tropes and random selection of words from school classes being source we call computer terminology instead of the best words to describe. Computer terminology not the only field terminology with this problem either.

Really I wish this language correction was having nothing to-do with being "Inclusive Terminology" instead just be a simple admit to ourselves we have been insanely lazy with our usage and creation of terminology and have got into habit of using poorly describing terminology that we really need to fix. Yes different people will fight to keep the poor describing terminology not because they bias but change in terminology means they will have to learn something different human nature to resist change. This is why its better if you can with terminology to invest time in money at the start getting it right than having to correct it latter.

I agree, we're desperately understaffed with technical writers. I don't see the use of figurative langue as a problem though, it expands the vocabulary without introducing redundant terms at the cost of requiring a little imagination to transfer the essence between the literal words and a reasonable good faith interpretation. I'd speculate this is an inherent problem with having such an open ecosystem; those who write code out of passion don't tend to delve too deep into how to write good technical documentation. But at the end of the day, do we really want them to?

Good documentation can be a lifesaver but wouldn't you rather they focus on their area of expertise instead? Bureaucracy is a very effective motivation killer so if we push too hard we're just going to force them to go elsewhere. I try my best to write documentation for my code but keeping it up to date is more of a burden than anything else, I'd rather just keep sprinkling comments in the source files.

Back on topic; truth to be told there is no universal replacement for master/slave without using direct synonyms. The same goes for blacklist and whitelist. But if you need to use synonyms anyway, why not use the original terms? Aren't the synonyms just going to inherit virtually the same problems as they gain traction?

[oiaohm]

Again, I'm not against replacing inaccurate terms with better ones, but there's inevitably going to be cases where master/slave are the proper and accurate terms to describe the code.

Over usage also mean we have usage of Master/Slave that when you look closely is either wrong or incorrectly descriptive. Its bit like X11 Client and Server when you look at the fine defines of Client Server X11 uses them inverted in may places.

That's clearly not true. Even Wikipedia quotes the use of the term blacklist in the 1639 play "The Unnatural Combat", way before the period of 1850-1910 usually referred to as "The Wild West".

Except that is not the origin of the computer world term blacklist. 3 terms end in list enter the computer world at the same time. Blacklist, Greylist and Whitelist. All three enter the computer world language after the blackhat, whitehat and grayhat hacker that comes straight from the Holywood wild west trope even better the first findable usage in source code directly mentions the trope. Before the 1960 we don't have computer networking and we don't have firewalls and computers are not using anything need allow/deny lists.

That's not the first instance of using black for negative and white for positive either, nor is it the only one. The first documented use of a white flag to indicate surrender (positive intentions) was from AD 109, while the black flag was first used in 1524 as a symbol of revolt (negative intentions).

This is cognitive bias you are only looking for cases where black is negative and white is positive there are inverted examples when you look for them.

By the way it was redoing that 1639 play The Unnatural Combat that caused me as a prop person to have to work out how the blacklist in that play should be done to be right. Cost me 18 months of research. Correct answer for that play is the names written on the page in wax then the page covered in ink. Why is this so hard to work out is are you describing the color of the text or the color of the page. So that blacklist by other authors and performers could be called a whitelist because the text is white. When you think about it a guy willing to waste a stack of valuable ink to list he wants revenge on does added to how determined Charles II is and does open up a creative stage play move of having paper written in wax and actor spread ink over the page to make the names appear.

Also that is not the first usage of the term blacklist its not even close you are looking for guides to accountancy printed by Johannes Gutenberg some time around 1440 and these are reprints of even older what was hand written documents before that and the different authors had different options way back then what was whitelist and blacklist. These are not to vengeful usages either is how to clearly write a money loss. The Unnatural Combat is the first documented usage of Blacklist in a vengeful way yes this is over 200 years latter than first usage at least.. The printed accountancy guides are suspected to be based on a frew hundred years before their printing.

There are more modern examples as well; in DC wiring black is used to indicate the negative conductor while red and other colors indicates the positive conductor(s), in US AC wiring the black conductor indicates line (the one that kills you) while the white one indicates neutral (the one that doesn't kill you).

If anything red is the ambiguous color.

https://p3connectors.com/electrical-wiring-colours-standards/

Please note black is a ambiguous color as well like it or not. Note how UK old and Australia in history the black was neutral and the red is the one that kills you. Some old Australian AC wiring is black and white guess what inverted to current day USA.

There is a reason why Neutral is black in old UK and Australian wiring. Single-phase power on a single supply wire run the Neutral goes to earth spike the being black it is the same colour as your negative DC wire that is the same wire you also connect to ground. earth spike on radios.

Yes USA and Australia can be using the exact same rolls of three phase cable just the ends are wired completely different and we Australians are not wiring with some stupid bias that white has to be good. Yes nice case of arbitrary assignments causing lethality problems. Yes USA system you have a earth spike with stack fo DC items connected with black-wires and someone connects a USA AC black write turns all those devices lethal and does not look out of place because everything is black..

Yes current Europe & UK has blue as neutral of course they are smart that Line 1 is not black so you cannot have a single phase single wire setup where neutral goes to earth being mixed on a earth spike incorrectly. Yes USA wiring standard placement of white and black in AC stupid and dangerous. Yes black being netural in the Australian one could be question if it should be phase 2/3 as well to make it clearer what earth spikes have AC connected.

There's also no practical way of using white lettering on white paper. Same reason bright papyri was written on with dark reed pens.

Its easy to write white on the white paper by writing using wax then inking around text. Of course candle wax was a really simple item to get and the pad with ink in it is of course your blotting pad for inking your seals this allowed 1 type of ink for everything and you had to buy candles to work by anyhow. Sorry your no practical way is true at all you have limited your method. Yes invisible ink style method where you write what is invisible then make it appear is how it documented as done..

Back on topic; truth to be told there is no universal replacement for master/slave without using direct synonyms. The same goes for blacklist and whitelist. But if you need to use synonyms anyway, why not use the original terms? Aren't the synonyms just going to inherit virtually the same problems as they gain traction?

Master/Slave there is room for debate there.

Blacklist/Whitelist/Greylist in computer usage can be simply replaced with Denylist/Allowlist/Filterlist in all cases I have found. Colors like it or not are arbitrary assignments depend on a person background may have different meanings to what is expected. Yes is like AC electrical wiring when you have devices from all different countries you cannot presume that black is neutral or active just like it does not pay to presume black is bad or good. Yes with AC you call stuff active and netural by names that have meaning not the color because using the color is path to hell.

[Djhg2000]

Over usage also mean we have usage of Master/Slave that when you look closely is either wrong or incorrectly descriptive. Its bit like X11 Client and Server when you look at the fine defines of Client Server X11 uses them inverted in may places.

I'm trying my best not to sound condescending here, but since when has X11 been a good example of... well anything? X11 is probably the most patched to death software we're still running outside of a certain Redmond product. Inversion of server/client has been a bane of X11 for decades but yet the terminology lives one because everyone has gotten used to it.

Either way master/slave is a pretty lazy way of doing things to begin with but it has stuck around anyway because it's super simple to understand and no matter which of the terms you come across first in the code it's immediately obvious the other one exists somewhere.

(As an aside I don't think master/slave should be capitalized, they're regular words just like any other.)

Except that is not the origin of the computer world term blacklist. 3 terms end in list enter the computer world at the same time. Blacklist, Greylist and Whitelist. All three enter the computer world language after the blackhat, whitehat and grayhat hacker that comes straight from the Holywood wild west trope even better the first findable usage in source code directly mentions the trope. Before the 1960 we don't have computer networking and we don't have firewalls and computers are not using anything need allow/deny lists.

Well I guess you got me on that one. But what does that prove towards the topic at hand anyway? If it referred to hats then it clearly didn't refer to skin color and as such is categorically not racist, right? I'd even go as far as to advocating for this to be an explanation of how blacklists and whitelists work in computing, it has an interesting origin story and everything.

This is cognitive bias you are only looking for cases where black is negative and white is positive there are inverted examples when you look for them.

It's actually a mix of cognitive bias and search engine bias. Due to the popularity of this very subject the high relevance search results are all about how white must be some white privilege garbage and black must be oppressing people of color. I need to sift though all of that political crap just to get to anything regarding the symbolism of monochromatic indicators.

At some point you just can't be bothered to click "next page", even though you should in order to find the neutral results with low click scoring.

By the way it was redoing that 1639 play The Unnatural Combat that caused me as a prop person to have to work out how the blacklist in that play should be done to be right. Cost me 18 months of research. Correct answer for that play is the names written on the page in wax then the page covered in ink. Why is this so hard to work out is are you describing the color of the text or the color of the page. So that blacklist by other authors and performers could be called a whitelist because the text is white. When you think about it a guy willing to waste a stack of valuable ink to list he wants revenge on does added to how determined Charles II is and does open up a creative stage play move of having paper written in wax and actor spread ink over the page to make the names appear.

That's actually some neat trivia, I appreciate your dedication to doing things right as a prop person. So the idea was that the ink would flow around the protruding text? I must admit I'm more interested in the actual physical blacklist now than the blacklist/whitelist debate we were having.

Also that is not the first usage of the term blacklist its not even close you are looking for guides to accountancy printed by Johannes Gutenberg some time around 1440 and these are reprints of even older what was hand written documents before that and the different authors had different options way back then what was whitelist and blacklist. These are not to vengeful usages either is how to clearly write a money loss. The Unnatural Combat is the first documented usage of Blacklist in a vengeful way yes this is over 200 years latter than first usage at least.. The printed accountancy guides are suspected to be based on a frew hundred years before their printing.

Right, so basically every field had their own interpretation of what should be a blacklist and what should be a whitelist. Why should computing not just keep going as usual then? If it's clearly not an anomaly to have to define what a blacklist and a whitelist is, why should we be any different?

https://p3connectors.com/electrical-wiring-colours-standards/

Please note black is a ambiguous color as well like it or not. Note how UK old and Australia in history the black was neutral and the red is the one that kills you. Some old Australian AC wiring is black and white guess what inverted to current day USA.

There is a reason why Neutral is black in old UK and Australian wiring. Single-phase power on a single supply wire run the Neutral goes to earth spike the being black it is the same colour as your negative DC wire that is the same wire you also connect to ground. earth spike on radios.

Yes USA and Australia can be using the exact same rolls of three phase cable just the ends are wired completely different and we Australians are not wiring with some stupid bias that white has to be good. Yes nice case of arbitrary assignments causing lethality problems. Yes USA system you have a earth spike with stack fo DC items connected with black-wires and someone connects a USA AC black write turns all those devices lethal and does not look out of place because everything is black..

Yes current Europe & UK has blue as neutral of course they are smart that Line 1 is not black so you cannot have a single phase single wire setup where neutral goes to earth being mixed on a earth spike incorrectly. Yes USA wiring standard placement of white and black in AC stupid and dangerous. Yes black being netural in the Australian one could be question if it should be phase 2/3 as well to make it clearer what earth spikes have AC connected.

I was hoping you wouldn't put too much weight onto the AC wiring standards because they truly are horrible. "Standards are great, everybody should have one!"

Where I live the use of black wiring is as ambiguous as can be. The current standard calls for black to be L2, the old one said L1 and before that black was used pretty much randomly; sometimes all three phases were black with labels, sometimes it was the neutral and sometimes it was some home cooked convention (just because it was illegal doesn't mean it didn't happen).

Its easy to write white on the white paper by writing using wax then inking around text. Of course candle wax was a really simple item to get and the pad with ink in it is of course your blotting pad for inking your seals this allowed 1 type of ink for everything and you had to buy candles to work by anyhow. Sorry your no practical way is true at all you have limited your method. Yes invisible ink style method where you write what is invisible then make it appear is how it documented as done..

Technically correct but no accountant in their right mind would use wax and lots of ink.

Master/Slave there is room for debate there.

I think you're going to have a hard time finding terms more descriptive. Even the best I could come up with, controller/node, doesn't make it immediately obvious that a node needs a controller to function. The controller kind of implies it needs something to control but it needs additional context for it to be analogous to master. The controller could just as well be its function in a macroscopic context (like an "air bag controller" in a car). It's also a more complicated word phonetically, which would inevitably hamper its adoption.

Blacklist/Whitelist/Greylist in computer usage can be simply replaced with Denylist/Allowlist/Filterlist in all cases I have found. Colors like it or not are arbitrary assignments depend on a person background may have different meanings to what is expected. Yes is like AC electrical wiring when you have devices from all different countries you cannot presume that black is neutral or active just like it does not pay to presume black is bad or good. Yes with AC you call stuff active and netural by names that have meaning not the color because using the color is path to hell.

Continuing with the phonetics reasoning I think you'd have better luck with something like offlist, onlist and switchlist. I don't think trying to change them out this quickly is going to work anyway when blacklist and whitelist are fairly deeply engraved in the industry but if enough peripheral code start out with it then it could become viable as a change in the kernel a few decades down the line for new code.

As luck would have it, I came across an example of when this change gets destructive just a few hours ago. Here is the diff for the latest libvirt-daemon-system config update in Debian:

--- /etc/libvirt/qemu.conf 2020-07-13 19:38:22.981996824 +0200
+++ /etc/libvirt/qemu.conf.dpkg-new 2020-07-27 22:50:08.000000000 +0200
@@ -464,7 +464,7 @@
# What cgroup controllers to make use of with QEMU guests
#
# - 'cpu' - use for scheduler tunables
-# - 'devices' - use for device whitelisting
+# - 'devices' - use for device access control
# - 'memory' - use for memory tunables
# - 'blkio' - use for block devices I/O tunables
# - 'cpuset' - use for CPUs and memory nodes

Note how it's no longer clear if the devices here are allowed or denied access. It's barely even clear if these devices control the access or the access of the devices are controlled. All of which was summarized with a single word before this change.