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>] [--[no-]informative-errors]
  20              [--inetd |
  21               [--listen=<host_or_ipaddr>] [--port=<n>]
  22               [--user=<user> [--group=<group>]]]
  23              [<directory>...]
  24
  25 DESCRIPTION
  26 -----------
  27 A really simple TCP Git daemon that normally listens on port "DEFAULT_GIT_PORT"
  28 aka 9418.  It waits for a connection asking for a service, and will serve
  29 that service if it is enabled.
  30
  31 It verifies that the directory has the magic file "git-daemon-export-ok", and
  32 it will refuse to export any Git directory that hasn't explicitly been marked
  33 for export this way (unless the '--export-all' parameter is specified). If you
  34 pass some directory paths as 'git daemon' arguments, you can further restrict
  35 the offers to a whitelist comprising of those.
  36
  37 By default, only `upload-pack` service is enabled, which serves
  38 'git fetch-pack' and 'git ls-remote' clients, which are invoked
  39 from 'git fetch', 'git pull', and 'git clone'.
  40
  41 This is ideally suited for read-only updates, i.e., pulling from
  42 Git repositories.
  43
  44 An `upload-archive` also exists to serve 'git archive'.
  45
  46 OPTIONS
  47 -------
  48 --strict-paths::
  49         Match paths exactly (i.e. don't allow "/foo/repo" when the real path is
  50         "/foo/repo.git" or "/foo/repo/.git") and don't do user-relative paths.
  51         'git daemon' will refuse to start when this option is enabled and no
  52         whitelist is specified.
  53
  54 --base-path=<path>::
  55         Remap all the path requests as relative to the given path.
  56         This is sort of "Git root" - if you run 'git daemon' with
  57         '--base-path=/srv/git' on example.com, then if you later try to pull
  58         'git://example.com/hello.git', 'git daemon' will interpret the path
  59         as '/srv/git/hello.git'.
  60
  61 --base-path-relaxed::
  62         If --base-path is enabled and repo lookup fails, with this option
  63         'git daemon' will attempt to lookup without prefixing the base path.
  64         This is useful for switching to --base-path usage, while still
  65         allowing the old paths.
  66
  67 --interpolated-path=<pathtemplate>::
  68         To support virtual hosting, an interpolated path template can be
  69         used to dynamically construct alternate paths.  The template
  70         supports %H for the target hostname as supplied by the client but
  71         converted to all lowercase, %CH for the canonical hostname,
  72         %IP for the server's IP address, %P for the port number,
  73         and %D for the absolute path of the named repository.
  74         After interpolation, the path is validated against the directory
  75         whitelist.
  76
  77 --export-all::
  78         Allow pulling from all directories that look like Git repositories
  79         (have the 'objects' and 'refs' subdirectories), even if they
  80         do not have the 'git-daemon-export-ok' file.
  81
  82 --inetd::
  83         Have the server run as an inetd service. Implies --syslog.
  84         Incompatible with --detach, --port, --listen, --user and --group
  85         options.
  86
  87 --listen=<host_or_ipaddr>::
  88         Listen on a specific IP address or hostname.  IP addresses can
  89         be either an IPv4 address or an IPv6 address if supported.  If IPv6
  90         is not supported, then --listen=hostname is also not supported and
  91         --listen must be given an IPv4 address.
  92         Can be given more than once.
  93         Incompatible with '--inetd' option.
  94
  95 --port=<n>::
  96         Listen on an alternative port.  Incompatible with '--inetd' option.
  97
  98 --init-timeout=<n>::
  99         Timeout (in seconds) between the moment the connection is established
 100         and the client request is received (typically a rather low value, since
 101         that should be basically immediate).
 102
 103 --timeout=<n>::
 104         Timeout (in seconds) for specific client sub-requests. This includes
 105         the time it takes for the server to process the sub-request and the
 106         time spent waiting for the next client's request.
 107
 108 --max-connections=<n>::
 109         Maximum number of concurrent clients, defaults to 32.  Set it to
 110         zero for no limit.
 111
 112 --syslog::
 113         Log to syslog instead of stderr. Note that this option does not imply
 114         --verbose, thus by default only error conditions will be logged.
 115
 116 --user-path::
 117 --user-path=<path>::
 118         Allow {tilde}user notation to be used in requests.  When
 119         specified with no parameter, requests to
 120         git://host/{tilde}alice/foo is taken as a request to access
 121         'foo' repository in the home directory of user `alice`.
 122         If `--user-path=path` is specified, the same request is
 123         taken as a request to access `path/foo` repository in
 124         the home directory of user `alice`.
 125
 126 --verbose::
 127         Log details about the incoming connections and requested files.
 128
 129 --reuseaddr::
 130         Use SO_REUSEADDR when binding the listening socket.
 131         This allows the server to restart without waiting for
 132         old connections to time out.
 133
 134 --detach::
 135         Detach from the shell. Implies --syslog.
 136
 137 --pid-file=<file>::
 138         Save the process id in 'file'.  Ignored when the daemon
 139         is run under `--inetd`.
 140
 141 --user=<user>::
 142 --group=<group>::
 143         Change daemon's uid and gid before entering the service loop.
 144         When only `--user` is given without `--group`, the
 145         primary group ID for the user is used.  The values of
 146         the option are given to `getpwnam(3)` and `getgrnam(3)`
 147         and numeric IDs are not supported.
 148 +
 149 Giving these options is an error when used with `--inetd`; use
 150 the facility of inet daemon to achieve the same before spawning
 151 'git daemon' if needed.
 152 +
 153 Like many programs that switch user id, the daemon does not reset
 154 environment variables such as `$HOME` when it runs git programs,
 155 e.g. `upload-pack` and `receive-pack`. When using this option, you
 156 may also want to set and export `HOME` to point at the home
 157 directory of `<user>` before starting the daemon, and make sure any
 158 Git configuration files in that directory are readable by `<user>`.
 159
 160 --enable=<service>::
 161 --disable=<service>::
 162         Enable/disable the service site-wide per default.  Note
 163         that a service disabled site-wide can still be enabled
 164         per repository if it is marked overridable and the
 165         repository enables the service with a configuration
 166         item.
 167
 168 --allow-override=<service>::
 169 --forbid-override=<service>::
 170         Allow/forbid overriding the site-wide default with per
 171         repository configuration.  By default, all the services
 172         may be overridden.
 173
 174 --[no-]informative-errors::
 175         When informative errors are turned on, git-daemon will report
 176         more verbose errors to the client, differentiating conditions
 177         like "no such repository" from "repository not exported". This
 178         is more convenient for clients, but may leak information about
 179         the existence of unexported repositories.  When informative
 180         errors are not enabled, all errors report "access denied" to the
 181         client. The default is --no-informative-errors.
 182
 183 --access-hook=<path>::
 184         Every time a client connects, first run an external command
 185         specified by the <path> with service name (e.g. "upload-pack"),
 186         path to the repository, hostname (%H), canonical hostname
 187         (%CH), IP address (%IP), and TCP port (%P) as its command-line
 188         arguments. The external command can decide to decline the
 189         service by exiting with a non-zero status (or to allow it by
 190         exiting with a zero status).  It can also look at the $REMOTE_ADDR
 191         and $REMOTE_PORT environment variables to learn about the
 192         requestor when making this decision.
 193 +
 194 The external command can optionally write a single line to its
 195 standard output to be sent to the requestor as an error message when
 196 it declines the service.
 197
 198 <directory>::
 199         A directory to add to the whitelist of allowed directories. Unless
 200         --strict-paths is specified this will also include subdirectories
 201         of each named directory.
 202
 203 SERVICES
 204 --------
 205
 206 These services can be globally enabled/disabled using the
 207 command-line options of this command.  If finer-grained
 208 control is desired (e.g. to allow 'git archive' to be run
 209 against only in a few selected repositories the daemon serves),
 210 the per-repository configuration file can be used to enable or
 211 disable them.
 212
 213 upload-pack::
 214         This serves 'git fetch-pack' and 'git ls-remote'
 215         clients.  It is enabled by default, but a repository can
 216         disable it by setting `daemon.uploadpack` configuration
 217         item to `false`.
 218
 219 upload-archive::
 220         This serves 'git archive --remote'.  It is disabled by
 221         default, but a repository can enable it by setting
 222         `daemon.uploadarch` configuration item to `true`.
 223
 224 receive-pack::
 225         This serves 'git send-pack' clients, allowing anonymous
 226         push.  It is disabled by default, as there is _no_
 227         authentication in the protocol (in other words, anybody
 228         can push anything into the repository, including removal
 229         of refs).  This is solely meant for a closed LAN setting
 230         where everybody is friendly.  This service can be
 231         enabled by setting `daemon.receivepack` configuration item to
 232         `true`.
 233
 234 EXAMPLES
 235 --------
 236 We assume the following in /etc/services::
 237 +
 238 ------------
 239 $ grep 9418 /etc/services
 240 git             9418/tcp                # Git Version Control System
 241 ------------
 242
 243 'git daemon' as inetd server::
 244         To set up 'git daemon' as an inetd service that handles any
 245         repository under the whitelisted set of directories, /pub/foo
 246         and /pub/bar, place an entry like the following into
 247         /etc/inetd all on one line:
 248 +
 249 ------------------------------------------------
 250         git stream tcp nowait nobody  /usr/bin/git
 251                 git daemon --inetd --verbose --export-all
 252                 /pub/foo /pub/bar
 253 ------------------------------------------------
 254
 255
 256 'git daemon' as inetd server for virtual hosts::
 257         To set up 'git daemon' as an inetd service that handles
 258         repositories for different virtual hosts, `www.example.com`
 259         and `www.example.org`, place an entry like the following into
 260         `/etc/inetd` all on one line:
 261 +
 262 ------------------------------------------------
 263         git stream tcp nowait nobody /usr/bin/git
 264                 git daemon --inetd --verbose --export-all
 265                 --interpolated-path=/pub/%H%D
 266                 /pub/www.example.org/software
 267                 /pub/www.example.com/software
 268                 /software
 269 ------------------------------------------------
 270 +
 271 In this example, the root-level directory `/pub` will contain
 272 a subdirectory for each virtual host name supported.
 273 Further, both hosts advertise repositories simply as
 274 `git://www.example.com/software/repo.git`.  For pre-1.4.0
 275 clients, a symlink from `/software` into the appropriate
 276 default repository could be made as well.
 277
 278
 279 'git daemon' as regular daemon for virtual hosts::
 280         To set up 'git daemon' as a regular, non-inetd service that
 281         handles repositories for multiple virtual hosts based on
 282         their IP addresses, start the daemon like this:
 283 +
 284 ------------------------------------------------
 285         git daemon --verbose --export-all
 286                 --interpolated-path=/pub/%IP/%D
 287                 /pub/192.168.1.200/software
 288                 /pub/10.10.220.23/software
 289 ------------------------------------------------
 290 +
 291 In this example, the root-level directory `/pub` will contain
 292 a subdirectory for each virtual host IP address supported.
 293 Repositories can still be accessed by hostname though, assuming
 294 they correspond to these IP addresses.
 295
 296 selectively enable/disable services per repository::
 297         To enable 'git archive --remote' and disable 'git fetch' against
 298         a repository, have the following in the configuration file in the
 299         repository (that is the file 'config' next to 'HEAD', 'refs' and
 300         'objects').
 301 +
 302 ----------------------------------------------------------------
 303         [daemon]
 304                 uploadpack = false
 305                 uploadarch = true
 306 ----------------------------------------------------------------
 307
 308
 309 ENVIRONMENT
 310 -----------
 311 'git daemon' will set REMOTE_ADDR to the IP address of the client
 312 that connected to it, if the IP address is available. REMOTE_ADDR will
 313 be available in the environment of hooks called when
 314 services are performed.
 315
 316 GIT
 317 ---
 318 Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite