OT: connector terminology

Not seen around here. We call them male and female in our language.
To consider the pins and ermm.. the holes as 'convex' and 'concave' respectively, that would be quite extreme convex and concave. To me convex and concave is a limited deviation from flat. And what about the straight part of the pin or the hole. No way that can be interpreted as convex or concave.

I have seen once that 'master and slave' networks are frowned upon. Dont remember where I saw that.

Is it Harting that uses uppercase letters to indicate male/pin/convex/master/plug and lowercase letters to indicate female/sleeve/concave/slave/receptacle? I remember seeing that somewhere many years ago, but that was frowned upon as well because it led people think that they were saying that lowercase letters were lesser than uppercase letters and therefore females were lesser than males. Plug and receptacle make sense to me if I had to choose a non-gender way to express the connector I need.

people are losing their minds.

I have seen once that 'master and slave' networks are frowned upon. Dont remember where I saw that.

Click to expand...

You have seen that here, and one amazing, gifted, genius suggested Master and Servant as an alternative .

BryanG said:

You have seen that here, and one amazing, gifted, genius suggested Master and Servant as an alternative .

Click to expand...

Who actually has servants these days? Clearly the correct modern terminology is 'employer' and 'employee' as preparation for the AI revolution which will lead to the 'employees' unionizing and going on strike until they get paid.


Anyone objecting to 'male/female' connector terminology on the basis of 'gender' doesn't know what he's talking about. The distinction in connector terminology has nothing to do with gender -- it's purely based on physical characteristics. If there's an actual reason to change the terms it's that connectors don't produce gametes .

I think it's a consensus that "convex" and "concave" are not common terms in the connector industry either in the EU or USA.

Whether this specific A-B catalog used those terms as an alternative to gendered language, or just for kicks, seems undetermined.

Have seen Master / Slave revised to Server / Client.

"Pin and Socket" I can intuitively figure out. "Concave and Convex"..... uhhh not so.

Than again, maybe these are specifically made to provide field wiring to the Retro Encabulator so.....

https://youtu.be/RXJKdh1KZ0w

....and truly sincere apologies to RA - it was just too good to pass up.

Bob K said:

Have seen Master / Slave revised to Server / Client.

"Pin and Socket" I can intuitively figure out. "Concave and Convex"..... uhhh not so.

Than again, maybe these are specifically made to provide field wiring to the Retro Encabulator so.....

https://youtu.be/RXJKdh1KZ0w

....and truly sincere apologies to RA - it was just too good to pass up.

Click to expand...

hahahahahahaha.

plvlce said:

Anyone objecting to 'male/female' connector terminology on the basis of 'gender' doesn't know what he's talking about. The distinction in connector terminology has nothing to do with gender -- it's purely based on physical characteristics. If there's an actual reason to change the terms it's that connectors don't produce gametes .

Click to expand...

I know this will sound woke to many in this forum. This is just a personal anecdote. I worked for many years for a connector company. In Japanese language the connector terminology has the equivalent of male and female, and everybody uses it, just like we do in English. Connector people also use the word "mating". During meetings in which either female colleagues or female customers were present, the atmosphere was weird (in a way that was not when here were no female participants) when discussing about "...this female connector, ... that male header...".
I totally agree that the female/male is properly understood and that finding a suitable substitute will be difficult if not impossible. But I hope you can agree with me it is a safe bet to think that 60 years ago or so, when connector technology was starting to be developed, that in those smoke-filled conference rooms there were not tat many women participating in the discussions.

Bob K said:

Have seen Master / Slave revised to Server / Client.

Click to expand...

That's where confusion sets in. Both linguistically and technically, the client is the one doing the requests and the server responding to the requests, so it is the other way around.

edit: Actually, master/slave is in no way equivalent to client/server.
Client/Server is to me an event-based messaging system. Similar to how you would call a taxi when needed.
Master/Slave is a realtime cyclical IO system. Similar to how a bus drives a circular route with a guaranteed time between updates. You can hop on or off the bus when needed.
Just wanted to not be the source of a wrongful connotation of master/slave ~ client/server.

I worked for a system integrator doing a a lot of validation work, writing spec documents, etc. for a major pharma company. They (the pharma engineering guys overseeing our work) would routinely require us to change wording in our tech documents to more politically correct terminology.

I tried pushing back sometimes and they would just shrug and say these wording requirements were company policy. The end result is documentation that is not clear to regular people. It sucks!

JesperMP said:

That's where confusion sets in. Both linguistically and technically, the client is the one doing the requests and the server responding to the requests, so it is the other way around.

edit: Actually, master/slave is in no way equivalent to client/server.
Client/Server is to me an event-based messaging system. Similar to how you would call a taxi when needed.
Master/Slave is a realtime cyclical IO system. Similar to how a bus drives a circular route with a guaranteed time between updates. You can hop on or off the bus when needed.
Just wanted to not be the source of a wrongful connotation of master/slave ~ client/server.

Click to expand...

We shall henceforth use the terms Bus Boss and Bus Playa.

Ken Roach said:

I have been trying to figure out how one of my technicians managed to obtain a "mini style" 18mm 5-pin T-tap that had crossover wiring inside that smoked our sensor network.

And in doing so, I've found a whole Allen-Bradley connector catalog (889-TD002) that routinely and consistently refers to connectors as "concave" or "convex".

From what I can see, the "pin" or "male" connector is the "convex" one and the "sleeve"/"socket" or "female" connector is "concave".

Have I just missed a whole shift in terminology where those words, which apply to curved geometry, are used to describe connectors ?

Could this be a matter of an EU catalog translated without review for use in North America ?

I'm willing to have missed a whole shift away from literally gendered terminology, but I don't think I've read those terms applied to electrical connectors before.

Click to expand...

It's possible that you have stumbled upon a regional variation in terminology for electrical connectors. However, using "concave" and "convex" to describe the shape of the connectors is not commonly used in the industry. It's possible that the Allen-Bradley catalog you came across is using these terms as a means of differentiation, but it's not a widely accepted convention. It might be a localized terminology or the result of a translated catalog. I'd suggest reaching out to Allen-Bradley for clarification on their use of these terms.

I have never heard of this terminology being applied to any connectors.

Clear as mud to most people, I expect.