• GlibcGit
• MigrationToMain

Background

Today, all development happens in the master branch. We want to move development to the main branch. This document tracks everything that needs to be done, and acts as a status page for the community.

Check out the ''Rename "master" branch to "main" mailing list thread on libc-alpha for background information. If you would like to contribute to the discussion, please follow up using our MailingLists.

Some excerpts:

• Red Hat CTO about"Making open source more inclusive by eradicating problematic language"

• LWN "Loaded terms in free software" article

• Github changing the default development branch to "main"

High level plan

• Rename refs/heads/master to refs/heads/main

• Setup a redirect for users from refs/heads/master to refs/heads/main for roughly ~1 year

• Update documentation (wiki/manual/etc...) to mention main

• Send out PSA for people that main is the new name with info for how to switch

• All new release branches going forward will use main instead of master (e.g. refs/heads/release/2.40/main)

• Community members using master in their own namespaces should switch to main at the same time as the main glibc release

• Existing branches using master will be left alone and not renamed

Work TODO

A lot of this is on the server side, so unfortunately requires an admin with access.

• [✓] Attain consensus on renaming
• [ ] Review git hooks
  • [ ] Look for rules permitting/blocking non-fast-forwards, merges, deletes, etc...

  • [ ] refs/meta/config:project.config

  • [ ] hooks-bin scripts such as email-to-bugzilla-filtered and post-receive

• [ ] Rename master to main

• [ ] Create a redirect for master to main

  • On the server, run something like: echo "ref: refs/heads/main" >refs/heads/master

  • This should redirect pulls & pushes to main automatically

• [ ] Update documentation for the main development branch, and policy for creating new release branches
  • [ ] The source tree (manual, README, etc...)
  • [ ] This wiki
• [ ] Send out PSA to the community

• [ ] Add a hook to block creation of any new master branches (release or community branches)

• [ ] (After 1 year) Freeze the master branch

  • [ ] Write current commit to it
  • [ ] Update hooks to block pushes to it

PSA

We'll need to send a PSA to the community to let them know the migration is/has happened, and how they can update their tree.

To: libc-announce@sourceware.org
Subject: development branch has been renamed to "main"

In our effort to make the community more inclusive, we have renamed
the development branch from "master" to "main".  For more details on
this particular work, please see our wiki and its background section:
https://sourceware.org/glibc/wiki/GlibcGit/MigrationToMain

For developers with checkouts of glibc, migration is easy.  You will
want to rename your local branches to avoid confusion, and update the
remote branches they merge from.
# Rename local "master" to "main".
$ git branch -M master main

# Update the remote branch you pull & merge from (and push to).
# You will need to repeat this for every local branch you have.
$ git config branch.main.merge refs/heads/main

All new clones will use "main" by default, so you won't need to make
any changes there.

If you have any automated scripts that have "master" hardcoded, you
will need to update them to refer to "main".

We do not plan on renaming any other existing (historical) branches.
Moving forward, we'll use "main" instead of "master" when creating
new branches (e.g. new release/2.40/main).

We also will not be rewriting the git history.  There is little to
be gained from doing so due to how disruptive it would be for all
developers involved and possibly breaking old builds, and we would
rather put effort into improving the now & future of our project.

Please feel free to respond to libc-alpha@sourceware.org with any
questions you might have.