threads / discuss / 37396

Wishlist: git fetch --reference

Subject: Wishlist: git fetch --reference

## tl;dr

4 messages between Aug 22, 2014 and Aug 22, 2014.

replies: 3people: 3as markdown or json

Howard Chu· Aug 22, 2014, 02:57 UTC · lore

I maintain multiple copies of the same repo because I keep each one checked out to different branch/rev levels. It would be nice if, similar to clone --reference, we could also use git fetch --reference to reference a local repo when doing a fetch to pull in updates.

-- 
   -- Howard Chu
   CTO, Symas Corp.           http://www.symas.com
   Director, Highland Sun     http://highlandsun.com/hyc/
   Chief Architect, OpenLDAP  http://www.openldap.org/project/

Jeff King· Aug 22, 2014, 04:20 UTC · re: Howard Chu · lore

Re: Wishlist: git fetch --reference

On Thu, Aug 21, 2014 at 07:57:47PM -0700, Howard Chu wrote:

> I maintain multiple copies of the same repo because I keep each one checked
> out to different branch/rev levels. It would be nice if, similar to clone
> --reference, we could also use git fetch --reference to reference a local
> repo when doing a fetch to pull in updates.

I think it is just spelled:

  echo $reference_repo >>.git/objects/info/alternates
  git fetch

We need "--reference" with clone because that first line needs to happen after clone runs "git init" but before it runs "git fetch". And if you cloned with --reference, of course, the alternates file remains and further fetches will automatically use it.

-Peff

Howard Chu· Aug 22, 2014, 05:25 UTC · re: Jeff King · lore

Re: Wishlist: git fetch --reference

Jeff King wrote:

Show 16 quoted lines

> On Thu, Aug 21, 2014 at 07:57:47PM -0700, Howard Chu wrote:
>
>> I maintain multiple copies of the same repo because I keep each one checked
>> out to different branch/rev levels. It would be nice if, similar to clone
>> --reference, we could also use git fetch --reference to reference a local
>> repo when doing a fetch to pull in updates.
>
> I think it is just spelled:
>
>    echo $reference_repo >>.git/objects/info/alternates
>    git fetch
>
> We need "--reference" with clone because that first line needs to happen
> after clone runs "git init" but before it runs "git fetch". And if you
> cloned with --reference, of course, the alternates file remains and
> further fetches will automatically use it.

Aha, thanks, hadn't realized that. Just checked and yes, the alternates file is already set in all of these different copies.

-- 
   -- Howard Chu
   CTO, Symas Corp.           http://www.symas.com
   Director, Highland Sun     http://highlandsun.com/hyc/
   Chief Architect, OpenLDAP  http://www.openldap.org/project/

Dennis Kaarsemaker· Aug 22, 2014, 07:01 UTC · re: Howard Chu · lore

Re: Wishlist: git fetch --reference

On do, 2014-08-21 at 19:57 -0700, Howard Chu wrote:

> I maintain multiple copies of the same repo because I keep each one checked 
> out to different branch/rev levels. It would be nice if, similar to clone 
> --reference, we could also use git fetch --reference to reference a local repo 
> when doing a fetch to pull in updates.

Alternatively, you can use Duy's multiple-work-trees patches to safely make multiple checkouts of one repository. These patches are in next.

-- 
Dennis Kaarsemaker
http://www.kaarsemaker.net