Documentation/git-daemon.txt

   1 git-daemon(1)
   2 =============
   3
   4 NAME
   5 ----
   6 git-daemon - A really simple server for Git repositories
   7
   8 SYNOPSIS
   9 --------
  10 [verse]
  11 'git daemon' [--verbose] [--syslog] [--export-all]
  12              [--timeout=<n>] [--init-timeout=<n>] [--max-connections=<n>]
  13              [--strict-paths] [--base-path=<path>] [--base-path-relaxed]
  14              [--user-path | --user-path=<path>]
  15              [--interpolated-path=<pathtemplate>]
  16              [--reuseaddr] [--detach] [--pid-file=<file>]
  17              [--enable=<service>] [--disable=<service>]
  18              [--allow-override=<service>] [--forbid-override=<service>]
  19              [--access-hook=<path>]
  20              [--inetd | [--listen=<host_or_ipaddr>] [--port=<n>] [--user=<user> [--group=<group>]]
  21              [<directory>...]
  22
  23 DESCRIPTION
  24 -----------
  25 A really simple TCP Git daemon that normally listens on port "DEFAULT_GIT_PORT"
  26 aka 9418.  It waits for a connection asking for a service, and will serve
  27 that service if it is enabled.
  28
  29 It verifies that the directory has the magic file "git-daemon-export-ok", and
  30 it will refuse to export any Git directory that hasn't explicitly been marked
  31 for export this way (unless the '--export-all' parameter is specified). If you
  32 pass some directory paths as 'git daemon' arguments, you can further restrict
  33 the offers to a whitelist comprising of those.
  34
  35 By default, only `upload-pack` service is enabled, which serves
  36 'git fetch-pack' and 'git ls-remote' clients, which are invoked
  37 from 'git fetch', 'git pull', and 'git clone'.
  38
  39 This is ideally suited for read-only updates, i.e., pulling from
  40 Git repositories.
  41
  42 An `upload-archive` also exists to serve 'git archive'.
  43
  44 OPTIONS
  45 -------
  46 --strict-paths::
  47         Match paths exactly (i.e. don't allow "/foo/repo" when the real path is
  48         "/foo/repo.git" or "/foo/repo/.git") and don't do user-relative paths.
  49         'git daemon' will refuse to start when this option is enabled and no
  50         whitelist is specified.
  51
  52 --base-path=<path>::
  53         Remap all the path requests as relative to the given path.
  54         This is sort of "Git root" - if you run 'git daemon' with
  55         '--base-path=/srv/git' on example.com, then if you later try to pull
  56         'git://example.com/hello.git', 'git daemon' will interpret the path
  57         as '/srv/git/hello.git'.
  58
  59 --base-path-relaxed::
  60         If --base-path is enabled and repo lookup fails, with this option
  61         'git daemon' will attempt to lookup without prefixing the base path.
  62         This is useful for switching to --base-path usage, while still
  63         allowing the old paths.
  64
  65 --interpolated-path=<pathtemplate>::
  66         To support virtual hosting, an interpolated path template can be
  67         used to dynamically construct alternate paths.  The template
  68         supports %H for the target hostname as supplied by the client but
  69         converted to all lowercase, %CH for the canonical hostname,
  70         %IP for the server's IP address, %P for the port number,
  71         and %D for the absolute path of the named repository.
  72         After interpolation, the path is validated against the directory
  73         whitelist.
  74
  75 --export-all::
  76         Allow pulling from all directories that look like Git repositories
  77         (have the 'objects' and 'refs' subdirectories), even if they
  78         do not have the 'git-daemon-export-ok' file.
  79
  80 --inetd::
  81         Have the server run as an inetd service. Implies --syslog.
  82         Incompatible with --detach, --port, --listen, --user and --group
  83         options.
  84
  85 --listen=<host_or_ipaddr>::
  86         Listen on a specific IP address or hostname.  IP addresses can
  87         be either an IPv4 address or an IPv6 address if supported.  If IPv6
  88         is not supported, then --listen=hostname is also not supported and
  89         --listen must be given an IPv4 address.
  90         Can be given more than once.
  91         Incompatible with '--inetd' option.
  92
  93 --port=<n>::
  94         Listen on an alternative port.  Incompatible with '--inetd' option.
  95
  96 --init-timeout=<n>::
  97         Timeout (in seconds) between the moment the connection is established
  98         and the client request is received (typically a rather low value, since
  99         that should be basically immediate).
 100
 101 --timeout=<n>::
 102         Timeout (in seconds) for specific client sub-requests. This includes
 103         the time it takes for the server to process the sub-request and the
 104         time spent waiting for the next client's request.
 105
 106 --max-connections=<n>::
 107         Maximum number of concurrent clients, defaults to 32.  Set it to
 108         zero for no limit.
 109
 110 --syslog::
 111         Log to syslog instead of stderr. Note that this option does not imply
 112         --verbose, thus by default only error conditions will be logged.
 113
 114 --user-path::
 115 --user-path=<path>::
 116         Allow {tilde}user notation to be used in requests.  When
 117         specified with no parameter, requests to
 118         git://host/{tilde}alice/foo is taken as a request to access
 119         'foo' repository in the home directory of user `alice`.
 120         If `--user-path=path` is specified, the same request is
 121         taken as a request to access `path/foo` repository in
 122         the home directory of user `alice`.
 123
 124 --verbose::
 125         Log details about the incoming connections and requested files.
 126
 127 --reuseaddr::
 128         Use SO_REUSEADDR when binding the listening socket.
 129         This allows the server to restart without waiting for
 130         old connections to time out.
 131
 132 --detach::
 133         Detach from the shell. Implies --syslog.
 134
 135 --pid-file=<file>::
 136         Save the process id in 'file'.  Ignored when the daemon
 137         is run under `--inetd`.
 138
 139 --user=<user>::
 140 --group=<group>::
 141         Change daemon's uid and gid before entering the service loop.
 142         When only `--user` is given without `--group`, the
 143         primary group ID for the user is used.  The values of
 144         the option are given to `getpwnam(3)` and `getgrnam(3)`
 145         and numeric IDs are not supported.
 146 +
 147 Giving these options is an error when used with `--inetd`; use
 148 the facility of inet daemon to achieve the same before spawning
 149 'git daemon' if needed.
 150
 151 --enable=<service>::
 152 --disable=<service>::
 153         Enable/disable the service site-wide per default.  Note
 154         that a service disabled site-wide can still be enabled
 155         per repository if it is marked overridable and the
 156         repository enables the service with a configuration
 157         item.
 158
 159 --allow-override=<service>::
 160 --forbid-override=<service>::
 161         Allow/forbid overriding the site-wide default with per
 162         repository configuration.  By default, all the services
 163         are overridable.
 164
 165 --informative-errors::
 166 --no-informative-errors::
 167         When informative errors are turned on, git-daemon will report
 168         more verbose errors to the client, differentiating conditions
 169         like "no such repository" from "repository not exported". This
 170         is more convenient for clients, but may leak information about
 171         the existence of unexported repositories.  When informative
 172         errors are not enabled, all errors report "access denied" to the
 173         client. The default is --no-informative-errors.
 174
 175 --access-hook=<path>::
 176         Every time a client connects, first run an external command
 177         specified by the <path> with service name (e.g. "upload-pack"),
 178         path to the repository, hostname (%H), canonical hostname
 179         (%CH), ip address (%IP), and tcp port (%P) as its command line
 180         arguments. The external command can decide to decline the
 181         service by exiting with a non-zero status (or to allow it by
 182         exiting with a zero status).  It can also look at the $REMOTE_ADDR
 183         and $REMOTE_PORT environment variables to learn about the
 184         requestor when making this decision.
 185 +
 186 The external command can optionally write a single line to its
 187 standard output to be sent to the requestor as an error message when
 188 it declines the service.
 189
 190 <directory>::
 191         A directory to add to the whitelist of allowed directories. Unless
 192         --strict-paths is specified this will also include subdirectories
 193         of each named directory.
 194
 195 SERVICES
 196 --------
 197
 198 These services can be globally enabled/disabled using the
 199 command line options of this command.  If a finer-grained
 200 control is desired (e.g. to allow 'git archive' to be run
 201 against only in a few selected repositories the daemon serves),
 202 the per-repository configuration file can be used to enable or
 203 disable them.
 204
 205 upload-pack::
 206         This serves 'git fetch-pack' and 'git ls-remote'
 207         clients.  It is enabled by default, but a repository can
 208         disable it by setting `daemon.uploadpack` configuration
 209         item to `false`.
 210
 211 upload-archive::
 212         This serves 'git archive --remote'.  It is disabled by
 213         default, but a repository can enable it by setting
 214         `daemon.uploadarch` configuration item to `true`.
 215
 216 receive-pack::
 217         This serves 'git send-pack' clients, allowing anonymous
 218         push.  It is disabled by default, as there is _no_
 219         authentication in the protocol (in other words, anybody
 220         can push anything into the repository, including removal
 221         of refs).  This is solely meant for a closed LAN setting
 222         where everybody is friendly.  This service can be
 223         enabled by setting `daemon.receivepack` configuration item to
 224         `true`.
 225
 226 EXAMPLES
 227 --------
 228 We assume the following in /etc/services::
 229 +
 230 ------------
 231 $ grep 9418 /etc/services
 232 git             9418/tcp                # Git Version Control System
 233 ------------
 234
 235 'git daemon' as inetd server::
 236         To set up 'git daemon' as an inetd service that handles any
 237         repository under the whitelisted set of directories, /pub/foo
 238         and /pub/bar, place an entry like the following into
 239         /etc/inetd all on one line:
 240 +
 241 ------------------------------------------------
 242         git stream tcp nowait nobody  /usr/bin/git
 243                 git daemon --inetd --verbose --export-all
 244                 /pub/foo /pub/bar
 245 ------------------------------------------------
 246
 247
 248 'git daemon' as inetd server for virtual hosts::
 249         To set up 'git daemon' as an inetd service that handles
 250         repositories for different virtual hosts, `www.example.com`
 251         and `www.example.org`, place an entry like the following into
 252         `/etc/inetd` all on one line:
 253 +
 254 ------------------------------------------------
 255         git stream tcp nowait nobody /usr/bin/git
 256                 git daemon --inetd --verbose --export-all
 257                 --interpolated-path=/pub/%H%D
 258                 /pub/www.example.org/software
 259                 /pub/www.example.com/software
 260                 /software
 261 ------------------------------------------------
 262 +
 263 In this example, the root-level directory `/pub` will contain
 264 a subdirectory for each virtual host name supported.
 265 Further, both hosts advertise repositories simply as
 266 `git://www.example.com/software/repo.git`.  For pre-1.4.0
 267 clients, a symlink from `/software` into the appropriate
 268 default repository could be made as well.
 269
 270
 271 'git daemon' as regular daemon for virtual hosts::
 272         To set up 'git daemon' as a regular, non-inetd service that
 273         handles repositories for multiple virtual hosts based on
 274         their IP addresses, start the daemon like this:
 275 +
 276 ------------------------------------------------
 277         git daemon --verbose --export-all
 278                 --interpolated-path=/pub/%IP/%D
 279                 /pub/192.168.1.200/software
 280                 /pub/10.10.220.23/software
 281 ------------------------------------------------
 282 +
 283 In this example, the root-level directory `/pub` will contain
 284 a subdirectory for each virtual host IP address supported.
 285 Repositories can still be accessed by hostname though, assuming
 286 they correspond to these IP addresses.
 287
 288 selectively enable/disable services per repository::
 289         To enable 'git archive --remote' and disable 'git fetch' against
 290         a repository, have the following in the configuration file in the
 291         repository (that is the file 'config' next to 'HEAD', 'refs' and
 292         'objects').
 293 +
 294 ----------------------------------------------------------------
 295         [daemon]
 296                 uploadpack = false
 297                 uploadarch = true
 298 ----------------------------------------------------------------
 299
 300
 301 ENVIRONMENT
 302 -----------
 303 'git daemon' will set REMOTE_ADDR to the IP address of the client
 304 that connected to it, if the IP address is available. REMOTE_ADDR will
 305 be available in the environment of hooks called when
 306 services are performed.
 307
 308 GIT
 309 ---
 310 Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite