Documentation/git-bundle.txt

   1 git-bundle(1)
   2 =============
   3
   4 NAME
   5 ----
   6 git-bundle - Move objects and refs by archive
   7
   8
   9 SYNOPSIS
  10 --------
  11 [verse]
  12 'git bundle' create <file> <git-rev-list-args>
  13 'git bundle' verify <file>
  14 'git bundle' list-heads <file> [<refname>...]
  15 'git bundle' unbundle <file> [<refname>...]
  16
  17 DESCRIPTION
  18 -----------
  19
  20 Some workflows require that one or more branches of development on one
  21 machine be replicated on another machine, but the two machines cannot
  22 be directly connected, and therefore the interactive git protocols (git,
  23 ssh, rsync, http) cannot be used.  This command provides support for
  24 'git fetch' and 'git pull' to operate by packaging objects and references
  25 in an archive at the originating machine, then importing those into
  26 another repository using 'git fetch' and 'git pull'
  27 after moving the archive by some means (e.g., by sneakernet).  As no
  28 direct connection between the repositories exists, the user must specify a
  29 basis for the bundle that is held by the destination repository: the
  30 bundle assumes that all objects in the basis are already in the
  31 destination repository.
  32
  33 OPTIONS
  34 -------
  35
  36 create <file>::
  37         Used to create a bundle named 'file'.  This requires the
  38         'git-rev-list-args' arguments to define the bundle contents.
  39
  40 verify <file>::
  41         Used to check that a bundle file is valid and will apply
  42         cleanly to the current repository.  This includes checks on the
  43         bundle format itself as well as checking that the prerequisite
  44         commits exist and are fully linked in the current repository.
  45         'git bundle' prints a list of missing commits, if any, and exits
  46         with a non-zero status.
  47
  48 list-heads <file>::
  49         Lists the references defined in the bundle.  If followed by a
  50         list of references, only references matching those given are
  51         printed out.
  52
  53 unbundle <file>::
  54         Passes the objects in the bundle to 'git index-pack'
  55         for storage in the repository, then prints the names of all
  56         defined references. If a list of references is given, only
  57         references matching those in the list are printed. This command is
  58         really plumbing, intended to be called only by 'git fetch'.
  59
  60 <git-rev-list-args>::
  61         A list of arguments, acceptable to 'git rev-parse' and
  62         'git rev-list' (and containing a named ref, see SPECIFYING REFERENCES
  63         below), that specifies the specific objects and references
  64         to transport.  For example, `master{tilde}10..master` causes the
  65         current master reference to be packaged along with all objects
  66         added since its 10th ancestor commit.  There is no explicit
  67         limit to the number of references and objects that may be
  68         packaged.
  69
  70
  71 [<refname>...]::
  72         A list of references used to limit the references reported as
  73         available. This is principally of use to 'git fetch', which
  74         expects to receive only those references asked for and not
  75         necessarily everything in the pack (in this case, 'git bundle' acts
  76         like 'git fetch-pack').
  77
  78 SPECIFYING REFERENCES
  79 ---------------------
  80
  81 'git bundle' will only package references that are shown by
  82 'git show-ref': this includes heads, tags, and remote heads.  References
  83 such as `master{tilde}1` cannot be packaged, but are perfectly suitable for
  84 defining the basis.  More than one reference may be packaged, and more
  85 than one basis can be specified.  The objects packaged are those not
  86 contained in the union of the given bases.  Each basis can be
  87 specified explicitly (e.g. `^master{tilde}10`), or implicitly (e.g.
  88 `master{tilde}10..master`, `--since=10.days.ago master`).
  89
  90 It is very important that the basis used be held by the destination.
  91 It is okay to err on the side of caution, causing the bundle file
  92 to contain objects already in the destination, as these are ignored
  93 when unpacking at the destination.
  94
  95 EXAMPLE
  96 -------
  97
  98 Assume you want to transfer the history from a repository R1 on machine A
  99 to another repository R2 on machine B.
 100 For whatever reason, direct connection between A and B is not allowed,
 101 but we can move data from A to B via some mechanism (CD, email, etc.).
 102 We want to update R2 with development made on the branch master in R1.
 103
 104 To bootstrap the process, you can first create a bundle that does not have
 105 any basis. You can use a tag to remember up to what commit you last
 106 processed, in order to make it easy to later update the other repository
 107 with an incremental bundle:
 108
 109 ----------------
 110 machineA$ cd R1
 111 machineA$ git bundle create file.bundle master
 112 machineA$ git tag -f lastR2bundle master
 113 ----------------
 114
 115 Then you transfer file.bundle to the target machine B. If you are creating
 116 the repository on machine B, then you can clone from the bundle as if it
 117 were a remote repository instead of creating an empty repository and then
 118 pulling or fetching objects from the bundle:
 119
 120 ----------------
 121 machineB$ git clone /home/me/tmp/file.bundle R2
 122 ----------------
 123
 124 This will define a remote called "origin" in the resulting repository that
 125 lets you fetch and pull from the bundle. The $GIT_DIR/config file in R2 will
 126 have an entry like this:
 127
 128 ------------------------
 129 [remote "origin"]
 130     url = /home/me/tmp/file.bundle
 131     fetch = refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
 132 ------------------------
 133
 134 To update the resulting mine.git repository, you can fetch or pull after
 135 replacing the bundle stored at /home/me/tmp/file.bundle with incremental
 136 updates.
 137
 138 After working some more in the original repository, you can create an
 139 incremental bundle to update the other repository:
 140
 141 ----------------
 142 machineA$ cd R1
 143 machineA$ git bundle create file.bundle lastR2bundle..master
 144 machineA$ git tag -f lastR2bundle master
 145 ----------------
 146
 147 You then transfer the bundle to the other machine to replace
 148 /home/me/tmp/file.bundle, and pull from it.
 149
 150 ----------------
 151 machineB$ cd R2
 152 machineB$ git pull
 153 ----------------
 154
 155 If you know up to what commit the intended recipient repository should
 156 have the necessary objects, you can use that knowledge to specify the
 157 basis, giving a cut-off point to limit the revisions and objects that go
 158 in the resulting bundle. The previous example used the lastR2bundle tag
 159 for this purpose, but you can use any other options that you would give to
 160 the linkgit:git-log[1] command. Here are more examples:
 161
 162 You can use a tag that is present in both:
 163
 164 ----------------
 165 $ git bundle create mybundle v1.0.0..master
 166 ----------------
 167
 168 You can use a basis based on time:
 169
 170 ----------------
 171 $ git bundle create mybundle --since=10.days master
 172 ----------------
 173
 174 You can use the number of commits:
 175
 176 ----------------
 177 $ git bundle create mybundle -10 master
 178 ----------------
 179
 180 You can run `git-bundle verify` to see if you can extract from a bundle
 181 that was created with a basis:
 182
 183 ----------------
 184 $ git bundle verify mybundle
 185 ----------------
 186
 187 This will list what commits you must have in order to extract from the
 188 bundle and will error out if you do not have them.
 189
 190 A bundle from a recipient repository's point of view is just like a
 191 regular repository which it fetches or pulls from. You can, for example, map
 192 references when fetching:
 193
 194 ----------------
 195 $ git fetch mybundle master:localRef
 196 ----------------
 197
 198 You can also see what references it offers:
 199
 200 ----------------
 201 $ git ls-remote mybundle
 202 ----------------
 203
 204 Author
 205 ------
 206 Written by Mark Levedahl <mdl123@verizon.net>
 207
 208 GIT
 209 ---
 210 Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite