Apple revises developer content to remove non-inclusive language from its wording. The iPhone maker announced this on its official developer website. Among other things, they are currently working on Xcode, the platform APIs, the open source projects and the documentation in order to provide the corresponding content "to remove and replace".
WWDC 2020 was the starting signal
The change began on 22. June in connection with the release of developer betas of iOS 14, macOS 11 and the other new operating systems, which had appeared at the developer conference WWDC 2020. Terms like "Blacklist" or "Whitelist" for example, were replaced by "Allow List" and "Deny List" exchanged. The term "Master" in the default SCM branch in Xcode 12 is now "Main". At the same time a revised Apple Style Guide was published.
Work better with the new APIs
Developer APIs with exclusionary terms ("exclusionary terms") are to be deprecated ("deprecated"), Apple explains. while providing replacements. This also applies to the internal codebase as well as WebKit and Swift. "We encourage you to closely monitor query alerts across your codebase." It was recommended to, "Proactively switch to the youngest APIs in the platform SDKs"
Github did it for Apple
This also means that APIs can get a new name. the same applies to specific code calls. Apple wants to avoid discriminatory associations in code and developer documentation in the future. For Apple’s own developers as well as providers of own apps there is a lot of work to do. Some of the terms have a long tradition in computer science, but Apple wants to avoid problematic connotations. Github has recently taken a similar approach – other organizations are also known to be planning more inclusion in code.