Apple updates coding terminology to remove non-inclusive language

In a news release on the Apple Developer website tonight, Apple has announced that it is updating its coding terminology. The company says that the updates are part of an effort to "remove and replace non-inclusive language across our developer ecosystem, including within Xcode, platform APIs, documentation, and open source projects."

At Apple, we're working to remove and replace non-inclusive language across our developer ecosystem, including within Xcode, platform APIs, documentation, and open source projects. These changes began on June 22 with the beta software and developer documentation released at WWDC20 moving to terms such as allow list and deny list, and main as the default SCM branch in Xcode 12. An updated Apple Style Guide reflects these and other changes.

Apple also warns that developer APIs that still include exclusionary terms will be deprecated as the company releases replacements. The company says that it will provide warnings to developers so that they can update to the new APIs.

Developer APIs with exclusionary terms will be deprecated as we introduce replacements across internal codebases, public APIs, and open source projects, such as WebKit and Swift. We encourage you to closely monitor deprecation warnings across your codebases and to proactively move to the latest APIs available in the platform SDKs.

The company has updated the Apple Style Guide to reflect these and other changes.