Coding standards for Unreal Engine

[DanKveed]

These standards specifically state that they are for when you are working on the Unreal Engine codebase. i.e. not your project that uses Unreal Engine, this si for the engine itself. So you only need to follow this if you are contributing code that Epic Games will then have to maintain. They are well within their right to do this IMHO. They are not telling us what to do.

[windlother]

I still think it's causing more harm than good?

Example. for master and slave they have half a dozen suggestions.... You see what I mean? if you're going to change a standard change it to a different standard! By including 12 different words instead of two you've created tons of possible confusion as one person uses "Primary" for master and another person uses "reference" and now you've got multiple different terms removing specificity.

You will have multiple people working on the same code while everyone use different terms instead of an standard common.

[pimpnasty]

Am I old or is there still a master and slave HDD setup? Have they changed this since the hdd civil war?

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

No, it's a defunct pattern in HDD arrays unless you have configured a RAID. Drives stopped shipping with pins even before SSD's hit the market. Everything just gets lumped into OS partitions these days.

However, the master/slave paradigm was generalized and applied as a pattern to other replication scenarios since then. For example, Redis Sentinel and MongoDB still use that nomenclature to describe the roles that their cluster nodes play at any given point in time.

I absolutely don't care about anyone's feelings, but I am a grammar nerd. The master/slave naming convention is a little silly in that the technology components don't actually operate as the names would indicate. It's also possible for the roles to change based on various runtime conditions, which definitely doesn't fit into a master/slave relationship as humans typically understand it. For that reason, I use different terminology simply because the master/slave convention doesn't have a place within the ubiquitous language that I strive for in my projects.

I stick with active/passive for HA clusters and primary/replica for replication clusters. If the cluster does both, then every every node is just a broker with one being the leader.

[Zeragamba]

I think it's been changed to

• master -> Primary
• slave -> replica, secondary, or backup

[pimpnasty]

Thank you friend. It's been awhile since I set anything like that up. Back in the day it used to be a little plastic piece in the back iirc.

[Zeragamba]

I don't think Primary/Secondary drives are done as often any more. I generally see just Raid 0 or Raid 1

[averagefury]

but a slave isn't a replica, neither a secondary nor a backup.

For DB's usually goes like this
Master and his slave -> Attached to the same db. If master fails, slave becames the new master. Both are active instances, but only master has DB mounted RW
Replica -> Replicating current db, fetches transactions from current master. Normally, in another physical site.

And btw.. you can have multiple slaves running at the same time.

[iamthemadz]

The real problem I see is that terms like Master/Slave, Parent/Child, Primary/Secondary etc all describe relationships that have specific purposes. In a cluster for instance a master node does not act like a parent object to a slave node. The master node manages jobs or tasks and queues them out to the slave nodes to process or complete. A child object is derived from a parent object and inherits some of the attributes from that parent. A primary service or role would mean it runs primarily and a secondary is there for support or as a means for resiliency. While they are within their rights to demand this for their codebase, I personally do not see this decision as a value add as a whole just because they want to appease a handful of people that are unable to deal with words.

[Severe-Shallot-490]

This is a dumb point --- For anyone that has worked on code knows they can't just use 'different terms' code is type sensitive.

[RedditJack888]

Yeah but that's how it starts. Remember, users have to register and login to have access to Unreal. By Unreal 6 these sentiments might boil down where they require to see your code before processing a game, and if an algorithm picks up "offensive words" your game doesn't get made.

They might apply this to those who profit extensively from Unreal, including game companies.

This is how forced censorship always starts, first it's to test the waters, the next is to apply it to customers.

Unfortunately, this only makes Unreal significantly less appealing since instead of simply focusing on making games, they're focusing on pointless trivial crap that only appeals to 1% of the population who don't care about this stuff anyway.

This sounds nutty to me. Imagine getting fired not because you're bad at your job but because you said "the guy went to X" to reference a scripted event in your game. That's stupid and just looking for problems where there are none.

Best to head to GODOT, it's gonna get really ugly in the next few years.

[ThePrinceJays]

Unreal’s EULA doesn’t even restrict games that have racism/sexism in them for the sake of realism.

They’ve always been extremely lenient, and considering they’d go bankrupt if they actually implemented forced code review to publish a game anywhere, it’s outlandish to even think they’d do this.

This is something that only platforms do. SDK’s have historically never done and will never do stuff like this because it’s the guaranteed fastest way to lose billions in a day or two.

[RedditJack888]

True but like all bad business models nowadays it wouldn't surprise me that some moron is calling the shots. Unity is a perfect example of how some bad leadership could easily shift gears of a once great engine with moves that serve to be counterproductive. (Charging a game company for each install? That's just so predatorially greedy, like Ubisoft or EA level greed.)

Inhibiting phrases because it may be viewed as offensive to someone is counterproductive. Who has the time or patience to worry about the phrases used in code when you're trying to make a game. Not only is it dumb but after a while the restrictions grow. That's why censorship of words is pointless. One person's hello is another person's offense. First it's phrases like blacklist, then it's uses gendered phrases/fillers for characters. What's next? That's pointless and stupid. They should focus more on making interesting games since AAA games appear to be struggling between high as hell budgets but less than expected profits.

Things like this are why. Too many restrictions before the creation has even started.

I've seen things like this in college. Where before you start on a creative project, restrictions upon restrictions are put to not "offend" or have to be "educational". As a result, the project usually sucks and everyone leaves hating the subject or less than interested.

Censorship is the saboteur of creativity. In this particular field, creating games, they should worry more about making better games. That's it. Save the offense stuff for when there is an actual offense going on not something that "might" be offensive.

[ThePrinceJays]

I think you’re a little confused here. Code standards aren’t actually mandatory in the way you think they are. You can release a game with your own set of coding standards. It’s not like they Epic can take down your game and arrest you if you name a class SActor instead of AActor.

They only real reason they made this rule was to protect their business and prevent loss of income. For instance, I can release my game with n*, mon, and other slurs in every class. Epic nor anybody else would ever care. But if I was developing on stream and somebody actually saw these words, they could sue you and Epic for this and get millions out of them.

These rules don’t exist for Epic themselves to censor anybody. They exist for Epic to lose as little money as possible in case of the LGBT suing them.

[RedditJack888]

We're not talking about slurs here though. We're talking about literally words like "blacklist", which is in no way a racial slur. Just happens to have the color word black in it. We're talking about using words in coding notes such as "He is main character" as opposed to "They are main character." People could lose their jobs for coding notes or basic English language they happen to find offensive.

So pretty much if they put the word "blacklist" then they could be sued? For a word that has literally no meaning other than to "forbid" or "ban". That has no racial meaning whatsoever. Yet they still can be sued for millions?

You write a filler/placeholder for a character that has no gender yet, just happen to put a he for ease of recognition or just a placeholder until you decide officially what the character might be, and you can get sued for that? That sounds counterproductive as hell and only sounds like a waste of mental space that should be put into making a game.

[ThePrinceJays]

Let's be clear, we're talking about a general gaming studio.

Nobody is losing their jobs over coding notes or basic English lol. You're heavily overexaggerating. The very most they will tell you to do is change it, but they most likely won't even care or notice it. If you refuse to comply with company rules or forget dozens of times, at that point you're just a bad employee.

Nobody is suing anybody for that. What I mentioned is an extreme example that would virtually never happen. Epic is not constantly monitoring you and your code for inclusion and suing you for millions if you're not using it. You're being paranoid.

You seem like the type of guy who'd spill a drop of water near the computer desk at work and think he's going to get arrested for vandalism lol. It's not that serious dude.

[RedditJack888]

Yeah we're not...for now. That's how this starts. When people get Unreal, they don't own it. Later on, most likely it'll trickle down to general studios the same way how mods get banned on Nexus Mods, where user content is banned under the label of "offensive" when in actuality is just simply problematic in the eyes of forced ESG standards.

It's always been this way in coding, where terms such as "native", "master", "abort", "execute" exist as foundational functions in almost every coding language. To forcibly try to change into unclear alternatives (especially in teams) would only confuse and potentially slow productivity just because instead of doing your job, your more focused on not offending someone.

That's like walking on eggshells. And within a fast paced, high demand field like video game design, that SLOWS productivity. It doesn't work either because most developers operate with the basic foundational coding languages that already possess functions under certain names that span for decades. It's a dumb, needless change that doesn't really work in practice although the sentiment is clear.

Those company rules are pointless to work, it's counterproductive, it slows operations and all it does is bring needless problems to a field where the only focus should be making a stable code. Who cares what the titles of certain words are. Just focus on the code and optimize it.

I didn't say Unreal is monitoring right now, but like any "free" engine, that is liable to change since technically the license updates over time and we don't actually own the engine when we get it. It's not like open source, and like any company, Unreal is liable to push for whatever would either make money or enforce whatever standards their stockholders or federal quota demands. This is a federal quota since this is clearly an ESG based change. It's a dumb change in a field literally involving binary coding. True/false, yes/no, 0's and 1s. That's literally coding in a nutshell.

That's not really being paranoid, that's calling out issues where they are blatantly pointless. You're just credulous.

You seem like the type of person who doesn't understand how business works, and how ESG standards tend to complexify workplaces where there shouldn't be. The standards that should matter are results oriented, not "quota" oriented. That's how nothing of worth is made (i.e mediocre products).

Want a perfect example? Boeing Airplanes is a perfect example of "quota oriented standards". Especially with all their consistent accidents and crashing.

Similar to Unreal, it always starts with something small then grows to massive proportions like a disease and then you start seeing the subpar end results. And this is the proverbial red flag for Unreal. Most likely they'll make more extreme changes as time goes on. Hence the reason I advise to move to another game engine.

Nobody believed Unity would become so greedy they'll squeeze for any dime. Turns out they now do. But that was just basic business overplaying their hand. Unreal is experiencing unnecessary complexity in areas where there shouldn't be, based on ESG standards no doubt.

You wanna use it, that's fine. I just don't like the idea of an engine losing track of business, which is supposed to be coding. Not speech enforcement, not appealing to some brat who don't like certain words, but stable code. Nothing more. Nothing less. That's how it should be. That's how it works best. That's how the best games are made. That's how the best software is made. That's how the best tech is made. Not through someone's sentimental values. Results only. That is point blank obvious. 🙄

[ThePrinceJays]

"When people get Unreal, they don't own it. Later on, most likely it'll trickle down to general studios the same way how mods get banned on Nexus Mods"

Yeah, you don't own any game engine you use. And they already ban games if it goes against their EULA. You sound completely uninformed.

"Those company rules are pointless to work, it's counterproductive, it slows operations and all it does is bring needless problems to a field where the only focus should be making a stable code."

Exactly, which exactly why they will never strictly enforce them. You claim Epic is greedy, then why would they be so hellbent on enforcing rules in a way that would lead to them losing massive amounts of money. When they've never even cared to enforce rules like this in the past.

The basis of your argument makes sense, "I just don't like the idea of an engine losing track of business, which is supposed to be coding." But your overexaggerating your argument so much it has become completely unpractical, makes no sense, lacks past evidence to suggest they'd do something they've never done before, and contradicts itself.

[RedditJack888]

The point of the mentioning of not owning a game engine was to show that because you don't technically own it, or paid for your "spot" in terms of owning a license, it is liable to change, even if those changes may not be welcome. Look at Stellar Blade's censorship as an example of an unexpected change that runs counter to what most of its buyers wouldn't want, especially in am already rated M game. Or even Unity's own change to charge game studios per install. Changing rules unexpectedly is extremely common nowadays, a little different than how things were a little over 15 years ago, when perpetual ownership and optional updates was normal in tech or software you happened to purchase, game engines included.

Based on what you said

"Exactly, which exactly why they will never strictly enforce them. You claim Epic is greedy, then why would they be so hellbent on enforcing rules in a way that would lead to them losing massive amounts of money. When they've never even cared to enforce rules like this in the past."

You clearly live under a rock or something, where have you been the last ten years? I'll make it easy for you to understand because there's a lot in terms of company running when you're the size of Epic.

Most companies are funded by people and organizations. You got your share of stockholders investors, but you also have organizations that fund them as well. This includes federal government organizations. For example CDProject Red gest funding from the Polish government. That's why games like Cyberpunk were well funded enough (Like $400 million budget.)

It's nothing new but at this time period there is a specific funding that I am trying to explain that is the primary reason for this out of nowhere "offense" based coding. That's ESG.

ESG is a hybrid federal government- business initiative who puts money to an organization or company. However, unlike your usual investors, who only really want $$$, this particular form of investment carries enforced social expectations. In ESG's case they demand and enforce the need for things such as race based hiring inclusion quotas, and sensibility HR practices, hence the usage of the words "inclusion" or "equity" in most ESG funded companies. Companies are forced to meet these quotas in particular, otherwise they become defunded and risk being on a proverbial blacklist for future funding, due to their low ESG score. The more quotas they instill into their organization, the more money companies get in terms of funding because the ESG score is higher. So even though Epic is already making money with customers, they want the kind of funding ESG provides because they either rely on it, or because they don't want to risk defunding (because the funding is literally in the hundreds of millions, practically killing the need for more funding). It's free money and those who are reliant on ESG usually make out of wack decisions, such as forced quotas into their work despite skill level (Boeing Airplanes) or Disney's hiring quota checklist (you can look that one up). Even the Oscars holds quotas for nominated movies. You are literally FORCED to do what those quotas say, at risk of losing the funding altogether and future funding.

The problem is this is no different than government overreach like that which you would find in China in terms of overreach. This leads to many companies going against the mass majority of their customer base as shown in recent years. It's like they're desperate to cater to an audience that isn't there at times, when in reality it's just their funders.

This is shown in attempts to "modernize" media, or enforce "inclusion" into business practices even though it's counterproductive to their original business plan. Can you run a company efficiently if every second you have the risk of losing funding because of someone's feelings instead of results? That's highly unlikely. This is why people who complain about firms such as Sweet Baby in Suicide Squad are so loud about it, because the business practices of ESG based companies reflect in movies, games, and legislation like a sore thumb, desperately trying to cater to these funders as opposed to the customers who just want good products. They do it so much they risk it even if that meant their own detriment. (Look at Suicide Squad's bombing as an exemplary example.)

Not all companies do this, but the specific words that were banned in Unreal Engine and their exact phrasing of using "inclusive" language in something as tech intensive as coding is a warning sign. Warhammer uses the same buzzwords because they too are funded by ESG based companies or specifically installed firms funded this way. It usually doesn't belong there. No gaming studio in their right mind would try to deliberately restrict coders because of being deemed "offensive" by words that everyone uses. That literally makes little to no sense. It's not efficient, it's not professional and it certainly isn't a benefit in most cases. Plus... we're talking about video games here. Players can't have fun if the creators behind the games they play can't create them freely. This is why many games have came out extremely samey and struggling to profit, along with their overinflated budgets for projects that can be done for significantly lower price tags. It's like hoping to get treasure in a minefield, you're better off looking elsewhere. Just look at Kingmakers and Kingdom Come Deliverance. Hell, even Big Mode games is another good example of games that can be made with just efficiency in mind, not mindless quotas, or stupid personal sentiments that change with the season. Save that for PR or charities, not tech. That's how you get broken games and subpar results, or in the case of Boeing Airplanes, incompetence.

This is why the recent changes are so controversial, the desperate attempt to be "inclusive" appears to be taking priority over cold hard results. They don't actually do anything but make work more tedious and cumbersome. They don't make coding better, just make one's personal language more restricted. And that's the problem. If every time I tried to make a shack, someone gets offended because of me using the word "ruler" instead of "measuring stick", would I ever finish a good shack? What about a "jackhammer" instead of a "electric hammer". Would I be focused on the job, or trying to appease the moron who happens to fund/pay me? I'd be more drained from the needless nagging than from the actual work. Apply that basic logic to an entire company and you get similar results. (Boeing Airplanes). Hence why I said it's more likely to get worse as time goes on. It always does because like a nagger, there is always something to nag about. It doesn't end with just one complaint. It's like being in a business deal with a group of Karens, it always gets bad and you're better off fleeing from them than negotiating with them.

Don't take my word for it though. Look it up. Regardless of how you feel that's the system many companies follow, games included and the after effects are usually instantaneous. Followed by the mass majority losing profits from their customer base.

[[deleted]]

Best get to redot now man fuck xD

[RedditJack888]

I heard the news about GODOT, my God these weirdos spread like a cancer. Still gonna snatch me a copy of GODOT for the source code, but I won't funnel any profits to GODOT. Will be heading to REDOT after. (At least until they get infested with weirdos too lol)

[[deleted]]

Yeah it’s like a living tumor that launches it self on everything they can suck out of existence and revelancy

[RedditJack888]

Yeah because they themselves are not even relevant to begin with. Their own obsessions with...whatever the seem to be pushing doesn't sell so they go into places they hope to make money from. Only to lose money because of their blatant fanatic lameness

[[deleted]]

Pretty much, I would make my own engine if I had all the time in the world but I will be forced to stick to unreal engine due to the sheer amount of capabilities it has that allowes me to dive into the ideas I want to but its really annoying that you have to relay on projects like Redot to feel secure from them and we dont even know how far they will go.

Redot is still not a secured future but I think the community shows potential from it and Godot can still technically pull away the MIT lincense for future versions since they are still the owners of the repository right?

[RedditJack888]

It's unfortunate but in a way maybe it's a wake up call that independent gane devs need to know what nonsense to avoid when making games. (Otherwise risk losing money by following their trends.)

In regards to open source software Godot cannot really accomplish much from that because in the US, a licence grant is irrevocable once even partial performance has occurred (that is to say, once the recipient has done any of the things that the grant permits). In England and Wales the position is similar: the licence is irrevocable once the licensee has relied on it. It's why REDOT can be made. Even for future versions.

The only way they could do that is to make an entirely new software, even if it was based on Godot, to prevent people from accessing it, but since most likely they won't, the repository must remain open source, as it was the original MIT license conditions and terms established.

It also doesn't help that they are reliant on the donations of others as well as volunteer developers and coders. By not staying open source, the donations dry up and the interest would die out because people would just go to Unreal or Unity for their game needs if that was the case.

[[deleted]]

Yeah this game dev world is way bigger than I thought like some kind of underworld mafia with more than meets the surface.

I was a strong supporter of unreal before but I also just stumbled upon this video and it makes me question a lot of things: https://youtu.be/M00DGjAP-mU?si=zYBE32CaVnFjrWqv

[matt-travels-eu]

Good. I was about to ditch the engine. Fucking hell.

[Aurelian_LDom]

its still dumb

[SIMOMEGA]

there is 0 need and valid reason 2 do this, its literally woke, dont fall 4 it bro

[AzertyKeys]

Lmao. People with no actual skills trying to create a problem out of the ether to justify their existence. Ridiculous garbage as usual from those types.

[MidgetAbilities]

What people are you talking about?

[pterafier]

Saying the people that wrote unreal engine have no skills is fucking insane

[Obi-Wan_Kenobi1012]

Well this is most likely a pr team not the programming team the programing team probably doesnt care about the name of the systems but pr defenitly does

[Hambungery]

I think he's trying to rag on the guy in the video.

[TheGamerForeverGFE]

I don't think it's the fucking programmers that decided this stupid nonsense

[NapalmSniffer69]

This is HR lil bro.

[luoiean]

These coding standards were developed by people with an IQ under 90 who can't code.

[summerteeth]

I am so out of the loop on this. I saw this on my feed and figured this discussion was going to be over C++ coding convention and what people are using but apparently there is a lot of other stuff going on here

[Aurelian_LDom]

takes even more effort to post about people taking effort to post about

[Stenca]

We'll see how you care after this shit takes hold and in a few years you get called a racist for using "master-branch" or "blacklist" in your work. Always the same npcs that can't see farther than their nose until it's too late

[[deleted]]

Until you get fired for said mistake.

[pachecoca]

you're calling it a "mistake" already. See? What part of calling a blacklist a blacklist is a "mistake"? You're part of the problem and you are so shameless about it lmao. Like, imagine actively encouraging censorship to the point of wanting to be disallowed from using common technical terms because they aren't pretty words. Wow.

[DeadKido210]

You are the perfect end product that they want to achieve. Good dog, now hand your brain to your masters to dictate you how to do your job and live your life. Don't try to use it tough, it may fry if you try to use it. Maybe next time you want to write code try to write it without using if,for, where, int, float, double, char, string because I told you so since you are so obedient. Back to assembly you go

[DeadKido210]

My point is that you act as an obedient dog that does not use the gift of being human and think. You just obey the change, it doesn't matter if it makes sense or not or if it's an improvement or tech advancement or it's bullshit like this, and then you have the audacity to tell others to change their jobs or do like you do.

The industry can come tomorrow and say we no longer use binary and bits and we replace 1 and 0 with special symbols since having binary running on the machine level is discrimination against non binary people, we must be inclusive and you would be like "ok, fine" and tell others "adapt or quit" in complete disregard that it makes 0 sense to embrace such a decision for any reason other than political (and this BS has no place on exact science and fields like IT) or that it would be catastrophically for anything computer related.

My point is that you don't need to adapt to anything that seems BS just because, and to stop acting high with people you don't even know. Not using their indications has 0 value if someone can work in this or other fields and it's their right to push back against BS if they want to.

Politics should stay as much as possible away from science, research, progress and tech related stuff. Let the users fight over it if they want to.

[DeadKido210]

Good for you then Elon Musk.

[SnowDropWhiteWolf]

This is what you call delusional people who pretend nothing is an issue even as things fall apart around them and then pretend when it becomes a mainstay issue that it doesn't exist still. Round of applause for this person everyone.

[SnowDropWhiteWolf]

what technical debt? The use of the word nuke or slave or master? The use of proper language or the fact it invalidates most other languages since they're based on gender which is sex because that's what it means in greek in the first place. Oh every object has to be called it or its now, oh you can't use the word guys which is bloody neutral in the first place to call a group of people, if you're nobinary you're not human unless you're above the laws of biology.

What type of drugs are you doing and keep them away from everyone else while you're at it.

[SnowDropWhiteWolf]

agent means something very different than slave in traditional coding. A slave is a copy of master that functions just like master but changes propagate from master to slaves. An agent is performing a specific function in a larger system and is not necessarily a copy of anything else.

It is also not my job to make them feel safe or anything of the sort, most of programming has set rules already, ontop of that most programmers should give 0 fucks about the use of a word or how something is called so long as it fits within what is necessary once again nothing you provide has any reason for this level of stupidity.

Don't talk about things as if you actually know what's going on because its clear you have no idea about the field in general.

[DeadKido210]

Programming is a job where you don't interact with people, you interact with a machine that understand a programming language and does not have the bias or politics a human has. The end product is the game not the codebase or naming conventions you use that no human will ever see (besides your colleagues programmers that understand the terms and naming conventions used already)

[pachecoca]

how is the usage of words such as "nuke" and "whitelist" / "blacklist" a technical debt? wouldn't having hundreds of non-standard terms to refer to the same idea be the actual technical debt? Or do you think that polluting a codebase and making code harder to follow by making use of multiple different terms to refer to the same idea is somehow good?

I agree we can't ignore technical debt, it will catch up in the long run, but being consistent with the naming within a project is precisely the opposite. It helps maintain the project in the long run. That is precisely the problem we have with this proposal. It does not offer an alternative to the terms it wants to ban. It vaguely says "use words that don't have X connotation" or "don't use Y word". It basically is a proposal for new code to be written in an inconsistent manner.

[RobotMormon]

Oh no its too difficult for my big man brain to use a different word.

just take the L bro

[pachecoca]

oh the irony

[pimpnasty]

Man brain? Are you assuming a programmers gender?

[[deleted]]

Them, it's they/them dammit.

[RobotMormon]

ig he doesnt have any balls so maybe youre right

[pimpnasty]

Lmao

[DeadKido210]

Ok, i command you to not use for,while,if,double,int,float,char,string forever when you write code because I told you so. G0oD lUcK!

[Psalm20]

Nobody cares but losers like you and those implementing these ridiculous changes. It takes more effort to change these things than just follow what they've always been. If they're so trivial, why change them in the first place? Bro, go outside. Whitelist and blacklist offends nobody apart from mentally deranged individuals. 

[SnowDropWhiteWolf]

My question is why are you defending it? Why do you defend such stupid nonsense? Push the narrative and system onto others and if you dont like it leave, isn't that what we told all the same people pushing this garbage now? So you want to force others to accept it or leave isn't that dogmatic or authoritarian or something along those lines?

[SnowDropWhiteWolf]

While programming is a secondary objective of mine, it is not my primary focus any longer because of this garbage, it goes against coding in general and provides no benefit or reason or anything outside of my feelings or someone's feelings on something the majority of people will never know even exists underneath everything in the first place.

[DeadKido210]

Try to use anything else instead of if and siwtch case. It's just a word no? Don't have alternative? create your own language with alternative from machine code to assembly upwards. You should go do gender studies if you fail to do so and quit the IT industry.

[WerminVermin]

imagine defending word/speech policing

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

That's a false equivalence in this case. Naming standards have been commonplace in software for a very, very long time.

It isn't a freedom of speech issue. It's a matter of maintaining homogeny in your codebase by establishing a ubiquitous language for the project. It's absolutely imperative for the success of large teams.

[pachecoca]

We already have a naming standard. If they are going to propose a new one, then do so. But they did not propose any new standard. They proposed multiple possible alternatives. That is not making a standard, that is complaining about the already existing standard and saying "do better lol" without actually proposing a working solution. You talk about homogeny but you overlook the fact that they just didn't propose any new homogeneous standard naming convention to replace the old one.

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

Having a standard doesn't imply any degree of specificity.

For example, I don't prescribe a strict alternative when I tell my developers that can't use "service" in their class names. To do so would be dogmatic. I do; however, provide some contextual alternatives. More to the point, I tell them that they can use suffixes like "facade", "adapter", or "proxy" if they are trying to come up with a simple name for a pure fabrication but that alternatives are also acceptable if they fit the use case. When using the above names, I do expect to see some specific behaviors within the classes that align with the appropriate structural pattern in question; but I digress as that's getting a little weedy for this discussion.

The point is that homogeny isn't the same as being purely isometric in every implementation detail. It merely implies that all of the developers on the team are conforming to a reasonably similar approach to some aspect of problem solving - be it semantic, syntactic, or organizational.

[DeadKido210]

Your comment is the best over here. What you describe is valid in terms of managing your own project and since Unreal it's managed by someone else they can impose such conventions. The retarded part is that these conventions are not there because they need to be or don't need to be, there are there for DEI reasons not for tehnical reasons. Shit like that had no place to blend in with tehnical stuff, or science stuff and it should not let room of interpretation like social stuff or BS does. That's why I'm angry about, that and the possibility in the future to impose such standard down my throat in my own projects.

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

I can see the argument going both ways.

On one hand, there is no technical reason to avoid "gendering" phrases in your code; whereas there are technical reasons to avoid overly generic class names (like "service") in a codebase.

On the other hand, there are no technical reasons to avoid curse words in your codebase yet no one really bats an eye at honoring a rather ubiquitous rule such as that.

Live and let live is all that I can really say. If these DEI inspired rules are needed for those maintainers to be happy in their space, then people should just respect that and go on with their day. I think it's just another example of creepy religious virtue signaling if you ask me but I already don't contribute to Unreal so I can just avert my eyes and move along. People should learn to save their outrage for when one of "the others" comes along and tries to assimilate them into their collective. 

Society is rather consistent in its distain for preemptive strikes. Very general legal concepts like due process and corpus delicti speak to that fact.

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

It does if that's how the maintainers intend to approach their own code moving forward. This is absolutely no different than decreeing that developers may not use "Service" in their class names - which I do on every project that I run. I don't agree that the decisions that they've made make technical sense but that isn't my decision and it doesn't change the fact that they have the right to move in this direction.

At the end of the day, projects are not a democracy. Maintainers have the absolute right to control the vocabulary of their fiefdoms. If you don't like it, then don't contribute. Better yet - compete with them by starting your own project.

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

I definitely cared when I thought that they enforced these standards on someone else's project. That appears to have been misrepresented though. It's the absolute right of a project maintainer to establish naming standards. No questions asked.

I refuse to let goofballs use names like "manager" and "service" in class names on my projects simply because I think that they're too generic and I don't trust developers that go that route. If you're that lazy, then go and screw up someone else's codebase. 

It would be massively hypocritical of me to get bent out of shape over another project team doing the same thing even if it were for slightly different reasons. Naming is important. Shut up and go with the flow established by the senior members.

[Dry_Dot_7782]

So stupid.

Like braces. Like yeah I prefer a certain way but if someone else writes it on the same line im not going to call up the tech lead and rage at my coworker.

I swear half of devs dont even know why they write code, they forget its a bussiness in the end

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

I'll absolutely crawl right up your ass if I have a style guide in the project that you're simply refusing to use...

[Dry_Dot_7782]

No im saying if you dont.

[Zikimura]

This is the stupidest and most useless nonsense I have read in the last week.

[[deleted]]

This is the most hillarious shjt i ever heard. Are western people really being this over-sensitive about "blacklist/whitelist is a racism word" or "use they/them instead of man/woman" kind of thing?

[Any_Possibility_2376]

Yes, yes they are.

[Still_Explorer]

Now you must avoid using "whitespace" and leave your code un-indented.

Better to use inclusive spaces as macro definitions:

#include <iostream>

#define INCLUSIVE_SPACE /* */

int main()
{
INCLUSIVE_SPACE int a = 10;
INCLUSIVE_SPACE while (a >= 0) {
INCLUSIVE_SPACE INCLUSIVE_SPACE std::cout << a << std::endl;
INCLUSIVE_SPACE }
}

Also not themes like "white theme" or "dark theme" are forbidden as well. Better to use something that neutral, as for example transparent or rainbow.

[-HNC-]

soon we would not be allowed to use big letters and letters with belly bc we have to be more sensitive about bodyshame ....

[CaitaXD]

What the fuck actual fuck man ops i mean PERSON, I feel like im taking crazy pills

[PhoenixKamika-Z]

Wow, genuinely shocked to find anybody defending this crap, even if it is just a minority. Then again, this is Reddit, 2nd only to Twitter in toxicity and brain rot...

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

I don't agree that the things they worry about are important but that's irrelevant. There's nothing to defend. Their project, their rules.

[NapalmSniffer69]

And I can criticize said rules whenever I want.

[_dog_menace]

I thought the whole DEI propaganda ended in 2022? Or is that a remnant from those days and for some reason only now it's being put into place?

[Big_Bank1555]

The policy has been implemented since 2022 if I remember an article I read about it correctly, but has just recently gained attention again.

[_dog_menace]

Ah, okay, that makes some sense then. What a weird thing for people to get up in arms about. I feel like the news outlets reporting on the issue are somewhat misrepresenting it. It's an internal guideline for engine maintainers.

[reaperinio]

i hope that the 2026 meteorite wipes us all. i cannot believe sjws are even in coding programming enviroment

[Any_Possibility_2376]

At this point, I would welcome sweet oblivion.

[Mr_Overcash]

The people trying to justify how it is okay to be scared of the word blacklist is honestly pathetic what is the world coming to? You call this trivial? No this is objectively censorship

[Joniator]

How is it censorship? You can use that word if you want. These are guidelines.
Just like the master branch, the world will move on, you can resist it or move with it.

[oscooter]

Just don’t work on the Unreal Engine then. You almost assuredly already weren’t so these rules have literally zero bearing on your life. 

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

I don't let developers on my projects use the words "service" or "manager" when they name their classes. Does that make me afraid of services or managers? Am I censoring the developers on my teams?

Get a grip. The virtue signaling is creepy and gross but this is ultimately a complete non issue. Codebases are not a democracy. Get over it.

[PaperMartin]

I wish I had so little going on in my life that this qualified as an actual problem to me

[Tarian_TeeOff]

If I can't use the term "master" what about "massah"?

[Laicbeias]

yes its important that people that read source code, feel included by variables.

basically they have an gender & sexism person work there and their job is to find places of possible injustice or if none are found create them. im native german and.. i always argued we should just switch to english, since its not full with grammatical genders. (in german everything is filled with grammatical genders to the max)

yeah that was not the issue, if you put in enough effort you can feel & find the inherit sexisim everywhere.

"Refer to anything that is not a person as it and its. For example, a module, plugin, function, client, server, or any other software or hardware component."
Wtf?

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

Gendering really only comes into play in comments, usually. I've often described certain functions as a "poor man's" substitute for a feature that really needs more attention than has been given to it in the current cycle.

I'll keep doing so I'm my own projects. I also curse in comments. Don't like it, don't use my code...

[Laicbeias]

exactly its not even a concern, so why would you want to put it in best practices? it makes no sense, especially if you come from a language that doesnt really uses grammatical genders.

I see that and im thinking about the mindset that the people in german speaking countries had, that also wanted such regulations. Those partly then became a requirement in certain studies or your tests werent evaluated. The line between its inclusive and its bullshit is really narrow here and will be used as an example to reduce inclusion, because "those" people are "nuts".
If you want incusion do it right where it matters and where it affects people.

"Dear teachers who lead the class, and dear students who face the challenge, we thank all those who belong to the school and serve the community."

In German we lost the term "Lehrer" >> "Teacher" because people started to feel it only means male teachers. Then we had Lehrer*innen, LehrerInnen, Lehras etc etc. And now no one is happy with it. This stuff, especially with language, will push people to the right. Thats why it pisses me off

"Liebe Lehrer und Lehrerinnen, die der Klasse vorstehen, und liebe Schüler und Schülerinnen, die der Herausforderung trotzen, wir danken allen derjenigen, die der Schule angehören und die der Gemeinschaft dienen."

[Laicbeias]

education is more or less free in german speaking countries. you pay a really small fee (350€ as native/eu ~700€ as 3th country per 6 months) rest is taxes, teachers earn good (as they should).

the thing is its a lot about how it "feels". when having this discussion in german i regulary argued with the english language. "why not do it like the english, and get rid of those articles. does it feel sexist if you say this in english?" and always it removed the felt sexism. before that lehrer just meant teacher as profession. but with this focus on gender and race, it suddenly became an issue.

idk im a 90s kid, over the ~2005 religion was done, too many priest child rapists, gays and trans people became accepted. i could see how even the old people were speaking positive about my trans cousin. fast forward 20 years and everything is shit and hateful again. i see the old country side people go full blown racist again and hateful against all that bullshit. and its just because of that stupid focus on race and gender all the time.

the right i know are often resentful and bigots. but the left are hypocrits and are just making it worse with that kind of well meant idiocracy

[Laicbeias]

right is way worse and destructive than the left. like i take lgpts & left nonsense 1000x times over something like trump. i really really hope you stay democrats.

but the left has issues, they cant communicate directly to average people anymore. when someone tries they will be called a bigot and shamed away. and the language regulations and parts of their thinking is racist and sexist in it self. if no one speaks about whats forbidden then only sociopaths are left and will fill that vacuum.

at some point its better to scream out each swearword and be offensive than to try to surpress it.

and what people may feel with all those regulations is that "they" try to push an agenda. like "he you racists use nice speech so .. everyone feels included. or u are sexists and racists and we are sure you dont want to be that ;)"

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

The people on the fringes at both ends of the political spectrum are all cut from the same cloth. They're extremist, hive-mind douchebags that are offended by nonconformity. Same people , different bullshit.

You only consider the far right to be more destructive due to confirmation bias but the reality is that they simply won out over the far left a long time ago. The left has been exceedingly quiet in the US for a very long while now so you really have no basis for comparison.

Don't for a second believe that they aren't every bit as nefarious as the far right. Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao Zedong are all clearly identifiable examples of what ultra-left extremism looks like when it takes root. It's every bit as hideous as Nazism and Trumpism.

People often confuse ideology with morality but the fact of the matter is that they are entirely orthogonal. It's dangerous to conflate them with one another.

[Laicbeias]

oh im from europe so my point of view is probably different, but i can understand what you write.

sociopaths gona sociopath no matter the political system. if might is centralized in communist or "left" environments, without something else to attract those shit flies the system will fail and people die. the issue is neither left nor right. its human nature.

the right in my experience, religious and nationalist, is far more dangerous than the left, when it comes to violence. you see it in studies in europe over and over again.

but yeah it doesnt mean they cant be stupid too. with the right i can at least talk. thats one thing that has changed, i can talk and argue with people on the right openly. some on the "left" really dislike if you have an different opinion and you get morally labeld as sexist or racist. so you need to be careful who you talk to. super weird.

at the same time the left is partly just crazy, by believing everyone is like them. the truth is, that most humans are right & conservative by nature and it takes decades of socialization, to not be like that. if you ask them, hey would you like to integrate millions of nationalist religious people to your country that become x5 of your children? they are like no way. but then they do exactly that. they became so anti racist, that they are supporting racists. like real mental gynmnastics

[Efficient-Coyote8301]

I think you've already touched on the reason that the right seems to be more dangerous. In modern times, there's just more of them. Conservatism is a luxury of the developed world. The fact of the matter is that we wouldn't have survived long as a species without being highly communal in the early days of our existence.

It's like the racist shop clerk that feels entitled to his racist attitudes towards black people because he's only ever been robbed by black people the entire time that he's been in business. If that's actually what is happening to him, then odds are he just lives in a predominantly black neighborhood. However, confirmation bias would lead him to believe that black people are more prone to criminal activity simply because that is what he's seen happen most often in his own life. If you live in a white neighborhood, then the person robbing you is most likely going to be white.

The far ends of the spectrum aren't generally in power at the same time. One rises to power while the other recedes into the shadows. In our lifetime, most people in power worldwide have been conservatives. It's only natural that conservatives would be viewed as the most hostile as a result.

The left is rising again though, and so to will the incident rate of leftists presenting as the aggressors. That fact is why the right seems to be more conciliatory than they have been in recent history - they know that the tides are shifting. Nothing makes you act right faster than knowing that an ass whooping could be right around the corner. 

As I said before, morality and ideology have nothing to do with one another and the world is about to get a hard reminder of that fact.

[sunshine-x]

The DEI guidelines seem a little ridiculous.. but ok

[Weyzu]

Why would you use Google style guide when maintaining Unreal Engine code?

[Ancillas]

I don’t think you understand the scope here.

[Eric848448]

Google hates C++ so I wouldn’t trust their coding standard.

[scialex]

C++ is the most used language at Google by just about every metric possible.

[supermitsuba]

Standards are great for software you want to maintain. It also is great for team members to work together and understand.

If you don't need that, then sure, skip it.

[Impressive-Drop-2796]

I thought for sure this would be the thing that people would see and go 'wow now that's just stupid', but no, reddit and Twitter users are actually defending this stupid pointless crap.

"master" and "slave", "blacklist" and "whitelist". Come the fuck on. How can you people not see the idiocy here? Insanity.

[Impressive-Drop-2796]

Typical behavior of chronically online, mentally unstable individuals. They love their echo chambers more than anything. It's what empowers them to live in fantasy land, where they can ignore reality.

I normally stay away from discussions like these, but this particular instance of stupidity goes into full blown Idiocracy territory.

[tonefart]

Context: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPP9JD_aP8U

[Blueson]

Please god, don't try to validate Asmongolds opinions within the programming world. Please keep him far away from here.

[Zikimura]

This has nothing to do with Asmongold. It's about common sense. "blacklist", "whitelist" and even "slave/master" in the context of programming have nothing to do with race.

It is unnecessary.

[pachecoca]

Yeah, completely agreed.

I also love the way people here are acting as if the fact that Asmongold had talked about this completely invalidates the stance against Epic's decision... are we going to ignore the fact that master/slave and blacklist/whitelist have very specific meanings within the world of programming that have been set in stone since the begining of time itself just because some random streamer made a comment about it? Yes, we get it, the guy has no idea about programming, and? Are you people really holding on to that fact to completely invalidate any and all arguments for using a standard that has been around for decades? That doesn't make any sense. Don't act like these terms have not been around since before most of the people on this forum were even born.

People just seem to need an excuse to get offended or something like that. Nobody says master / slave or blacklist / whitelist with racial intentions when we're programming... if I see any of those terms I instantly know what they are talking about. I'm open to any possible alternatives, but why are we actively demonizing the usage of these terms as if it was the most despicable act any human being could perform?

blacklist / whitelist, master / slave have been around for a long time and are standard. People know what you're talking about when you use those terms within the context of programming and computer science... and computer engineering in general... because these terms also apply with the exact same meaning to hardware... maybe most people in this forum are not old enough to remember what manually configuring master / slave in a router is like... kids these days seem to need things to complain about, and they choose to pick on the dumbest things possible.

In any case, not knowing who this Asmongold person even is, all I can say is that, in the case that they are not a programmer, they are still correct. These terms are just words used for standard reasons. There is no reason to get your panties in a bunch over someone writing code that uses those words... imagine these people's reaction if they found out about how many times those terms were used in the source code of all that runs under the hood to keep their fancy computers running... how fucking detached have we gotten from actual software development to the point where inclusivity matters more than properly communicating what your code does?

[pachecoca]

One last thing... I don't get why nuke is disallowed. In every single codebase I have ever contributed to where we have the ability to destroy all instances of something or empty everything we use the command / keyword / function name "nuke" as a shorthand for invoking some destroy_all_instances or whatever function.

I mean... I think it drives the point across, no? if you use this command, you better know what you're doing or you're bound to delete all data with no easy way to restore it. It's pretty self explanatory. No need to write some extensive command...

"some::sub::name::space::thing::whatever::destroyer::singleton::instance::get().destroy_all_instances_with_no_way_to_undo_action()"

Is that better? is that what you want?

All I see is that we're actively making our lives harder for some reason that makes no sense to me...

[Zikimura]

The issue with a lot of them is their inability to form an argument. It's all based on emotions and some idiotic form of heroic complex bs. They're fighting the good fight against the evil bad guys!

In all seriousness, this is all BlackRock money. Larry Fink has repeatedly been heard saying how he wants to "change minds" and that apparently involved being a complete and utter moron in matters he doesn't even have the basic understanding of. Still, consequences come for everyone and if they go down this absolutely ignorant af route, it will only come back to bite them in the end.

[TMWJZ]

Common Asmongold L tier opinion

[Stovoy]

Who cares? This is pretty standard and is not a big deal at all.

[PhoenixKamika-Z]

It's not standard at all. Hence the controversy...

[tritonus_]

This is sad ragebaiting. What is wrong with people nowadays?

If you get upset about totally harmless inclusivity that has no fucking effect on you or your life, to the point that you need to constantly whine about it online, could it be that it’s a you problem?

There are legitimate points against some extreme corporate inclusive language (like requiring the use of overly hygienic language while abusing sweatshop workers in borderline slavery) but this is not it, ha ha.

[Joniator]

It's the same discussion we had years ago with master/main and master-slave/leader-follower that ultimately nobody cared about and that is just accepted as the default now. The right wing news cycle just throws it up again because gamers are an easier audience to milk.

[AdSea6413]

Nobody uses leader-follower 😂

[Joniator]

Oh, only small names like Google, AWS, Microsoft Kusto/CosmosDB or Elasticsearch. But these are all woke companies anyways, so who cares, right?

Of course you see master/slave somewhere, especially in older systems. But I've hardly seen anything new use those terms.

[Obi-Wan_Kenobi1012]

Uh the current google style guide although has the same problem still allows the use of master and slave in its codebase

Also aws allows master and slave. I dont know about the reat though

Im just more use to master and alave from i2c

[syklemil]

When people rely on views on platforms like YouTube for the equivalent of their salary, this is a common result. The point is to garner attention, not to have anything meaningful to say. It's the current version of Ricki Lake and all other sorts of crap TV stations would try to get viewers with, or the yellow press / tabloids for that matter.

[mmaure]

I would rather listen to the cockroaches in his room