Replacing "master" and "slave" terminology

[John Bartol]

The answer, to me, is pretty simple.

The engineer is writing the application note. Thus, the engineer is not 
the audience. *He* is writing for the audience.

So... what is the terminology the *audience* will recognize? If the 
audience is tech-savvy, then they're likely to understand in an instant 
what is implied by 'master' and 'slave' devices. If the audience is not 
tech-savvy, then you need to determine what terms *they* will recognize 
or be comfortable with. The terms could possibly be one of the pairs 
suggested in the list in another post, or something else entirely that 
is *known* to that audience. The terms could very well be 
industry-specific jargon that you/the engineer haven't come across before.

In other words... check with somebody from the target audience. It's 
quite likely that master/slave won't be a problem for them. On the other 
hand, they could be from a group that objects to that term, or to 
'abort', and so on.

Karen Mulholland wrote:
> When two similar things - circuits, devices,
> mechanisms - are set up so that one controls the
> other, it's often called a "master-slave"
> relationship. For example, cars' brake systems have
> master cylinders and slave cylinders. 
>
> I've been on the geeky end of technical communication
> for a long time, so I'm accustomed to this
> terminology.
> That doesn't necessarily mean I should use it, though;
> frankly, it makes me a little queasy. 
>
> Today as I walked an engineer through an edit session
> on an application note that he's been writing, he
> volunteered that although he had referred to elements
> of his equipment setup as the "master" and "slave"
> units, he was uncomfortable with those words. He asked
> me what would be a better way to express the
> relationship.
>
> Here's the setup:
> MagicBox A and MagicBox B both communicate with
> BigDumbBox. 
> The two MagicBoxes are identical. Their physical
> placement is at the discretion of the person who
> installs them. They might not even both be in the same
> room.
> BigDumbBox shouldn't be able to tell that there are
> two MagicBoxes.
> To keep BigDumbBox happy, MagicBox A controls MagicBox
> B and makes it look like all communication is between
> BigDumbBox and MagicBox A.
>
> What would you call the unit that controls the other
> one? What would you call the one that is under control
> of the first one?
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