PSA and reminder:
The terms "blacklist" and "whitelist" are racially charged. Please use "blocklist" and "allowlist" instead.
Yes, the terms are old. Yes they're not directly based on race. But they _are_ based in the systemic idea that "white == good; black == bad". Just because something is traditional doesn't mean it's acceptable.
It took me a while to see just how insidious little things like this are, too. It's ok to take some time to understand. Just please switch terms while you do.
@danhunsaker i wish people converged on denylist rather than blocklist as the replacement term but it seems that ship has sailed.
@vladsotirov To be fair, I was thinking specifically in terms of instance level lists when I wrote that, and for simplicity's sake, opted to leave out other safe(r) alternates. Permit/deny are also fine, AFAIK, but personally, I think they fit other contexts better, is all. 💜
@danhunsaker where does blocklist fit better than denylist? my preference is only linguistic: denylist seems closer to the concept it's supposed to express than blocklist, but I probably just don't know enough
@vladsotirov If I'm blocking an instance, I'm not denying them access to me, but also denying myself access to them. This two-way denial isn't quite the same as a regular one-way denial, so it usually gets a different term, to help clarify that it denies both ways - a block.
To be fair, the specific behavior of a given list will do more, in that approach, to determine the appropriate name for that specific list. My recommendations aren't set in stone, so use responsibly. 💜