NAME
git-pack-objects - Create a packed archive of objectsSYNOPSIS
git pack-objects [-q | --progress | --all-progress] [--all-progress-implied] [--no-reuse-delta] [--delta-base-offset] [--non-empty] [--local] [--incremental] [--window=<n>] [--depth=<n>] [--revs [--unpacked | --all]] [--keep-pack=<pack-name>] [--cruft] [--cruft-expiration=<time>] [--stdout [--filter=<filter-spec>] | <base-name>] [--shallow] [--keep-true-parents] [--[no-]sparse] < <object-list>
DESCRIPTION
Reads list of objects from the standard input, and writes either one or more packed archives with the specified base-name to disk, or a packed archive to the standard output.OPTIONS
base-nameWrite into pairs of files (.pack and .idx),
using <base-name> to determine the name of the created file. When this
option is used, the two files in a pair are written in
<base-name>-<SHA-1>.{pack,idx} files. <SHA-1> is a hash
based on the pack content and is written to the standard output of the
command.
--stdout
Write the pack contents (what would have been
written to .pack file) out to the standard output.
--revs
Read the revision arguments from the standard
input, instead of individual object names. The revision arguments are
processed the same way as git rev-list with the --objects flag
uses its commit arguments to build the list of objects it outputs. The
objects on the resulting list are packed. Besides revisions, --not or
--shallow <SHA-1> lines are also accepted.
--unpacked
This implies --revs. When processing
the list of revision arguments read from the standard input, limit the objects
packed to those that are not already packed.
--all
This implies --revs. In addition to the
list of revision arguments read from the standard input, pretend as if all
refs under refs/ are specified to be included.
--include-tag
Include unasked-for annotated tags if the
object they reference was included in the resulting packfile. This can be
useful to send new tags to native Git clients.
--stdin-packs
Read the basenames of packfiles (e.g.,
pack-1234abcd.pack) from the standard input, instead of object names or
revision arguments. The resulting pack contains all objects listed in the
included packs (those not beginning with ^), excluding any objects
listed in the excluded packs (beginning with ^).
Incompatible with --revs, or options that imply --revs (such as
--all), with the exception of --unpacked, which is
compatible.
--cruft
Packs unreachable objects into a separate
"cruft" pack, denoted by the existence of a .mtimes file.
Typically used by git repack --cruft. Callers provide a list of pack
names and indicate which packs will remain in the repository, along with which
packs will be deleted (indicated by the - prefix). The contents of the
cruft pack are all objects not contained in the surviving packs which have not
exceeded the grace period (see --cruft-expiration below), or which have
exceeded the grace period, but are reachable from an other object which
hasn’t.
When the input lists a pack containing all reachable objects (and lists all
other packs as pending deletion), the corresponding cruft pack will contain
all unreachable objects (with mtime newer than the --cruft-expiration)
along with any unreachable objects whose mtime is older than the
--cruft-expiration, but are reachable from an unreachable object whose
mtime is newer than the --cruft-expiration).
Incompatible with --unpack-unreachable, --keep-unreachable,
--pack-loose-unreachable, --stdin-packs, as well as any other
options which imply --revs. Also incompatible with
--max-pack-size; when this option is set, the maximum pack size is not
inferred from pack.packSizeLimit.
--cruft-expiration=<approxidate>
If specified, objects are eliminated from the
cruft pack if they have an mtime older than <approxidate>. If
unspecified (and given --cruft), then no objects are eliminated.
--window=<n>, --depth=<n>
These two options affect how the objects
contained in the pack are stored using delta compression. The objects are
first internally sorted by type, size and optionally names and compared
against the other objects within --window to see if using delta compression
saves space. --depth limits the maximum delta depth; making it too deep
affects the performance on the unpacker side, because delta data needs to be
applied that many times to get to the necessary object.
The default value for --window is 10 and --depth is 50. The maximum depth is
4095.
--window-memory=<n>
This option provides an additional limit on
top of --window; the window size will dynamically scale down so as to
not take up more than <n> bytes in memory. This is useful in
repositories with a mix of large and small objects to not run out of memory
with a large window, but still be able to take advantage of the large window
for the smaller objects. The size can be suffixed with "k",
"m", or "g". --window-memory=0 makes memory usage
unlimited. The default is taken from the pack.windowMemory
configuration variable.
--max-pack-size=<n>
In unusual scenarios, you may not be able to
create files larger than a certain size on your filesystem, and this option
can be used to tell the command to split the output packfile into multiple
independent packfiles, each not larger than the given size. The size can be
suffixed with "k", "m", or "g". The minimum size
allowed is limited to 1 MiB. The default is unlimited, unless the config
variable pack.packSizeLimit is set. Note that this option may result in
a larger and slower repository; see the discussion in
pack.packSizeLimit.
--honor-pack-keep
This flag causes an object already in a local
pack that has a .keep file to be ignored, even if it would have otherwise been
packed.
--keep-pack=<pack-name>
This flag causes an object already in the
given pack to be ignored, even if it would have otherwise been packed.
<pack-name> is the pack file name without leading directory (e.g.
pack-123.pack). The option could be specified multiple times to keep
multiple packs.
--incremental
This flag causes an object already in a pack
to be ignored even if it would have otherwise been packed.
--local
This flag causes an object that is borrowed
from an alternate object store to be ignored even if it would have otherwise
been packed.
--non-empty
Only create a packed archive if it would
contain at least one object.
--progress
Progress status is reported on the standard
error stream by default when it is attached to a terminal, unless -q is
specified. This flag forces progress status even if the standard error stream
is not directed to a terminal.
--all-progress
When --stdout is specified then progress
report is displayed during the object count and compression phases but
inhibited during the write-out phase. The reason is that in some cases the
output stream is directly linked to another command which may wish to display
progress status of its own as it processes incoming pack data. This flag is
like --progress except that it forces progress report for the write-out phase
as well even if --stdout is used.
--all-progress-implied
This is used to imply --all-progress whenever
progress display is activated. Unlike --all-progress this flag doesn’t
actually force any progress display by itself.
-q
This flag makes the command not to report its
progress on the standard error stream.
--no-reuse-delta
When creating a packed archive in a repository
that has existing packs, the command reuses existing deltas. This sometimes
results in a slightly suboptimal pack. This flag tells the command not to
reuse existing deltas but compute them from scratch.
--no-reuse-object
This flag tells the command not to reuse
existing object data at all, including non deltified object, forcing
recompression of everything. This implies --no-reuse-delta. Useful only in the
obscure case where wholesale enforcement of a different compression level on
the packed data is desired.
--compression=<n>
Specifies compression level for
newly-compressed data in the generated pack. If not specified, pack
compression level is determined first by pack.compression, then by
core.compression, and defaults to -1, the zlib default, if neither is set. Add
--no-reuse-object if you want to force a uniform compression level on all data
no matter the source.
--[no-]sparse
Toggle the "sparse" algorithm to
determine which objects to include in the pack, when combined with the
"--revs" option. This algorithm only walks trees that appear in
paths that introduce new objects. This can have significant performance
benefits when computing a pack to send a small change. However, it is possible
that extra objects are added to the pack-file if the included commits contain
certain types of direct renames. If this option is not included, it defaults
to the value of pack.useSparse, which is true unless otherwise
specified.
--thin
Create a "thin" pack by omitting the
common objects between a sender and a receiver in order to reduce network
transfer. This option only makes sense in conjunction with --stdout.
Note: A thin pack violates the packed archive format by omitting required
objects and is thus unusable by Git without making it self-contained. Use
git index-pack --fix-thin (see git-index-pack(1)) to restore the
self-contained property.
--shallow
Optimize a pack that will be provided to a
client with a shallow repository. This option, combined with --thin, can
result in a smaller pack at the cost of speed.
--delta-base-offset
A packed archive can express the base object
of a delta as either a 20-byte object name or as an offset in the stream, but
ancient versions of Git don’t understand the latter. By default, git
pack-objects only uses the former format for better compatibility. This
option allows the command to use the latter format for compactness. Depending
on the average delta chain length, this option typically shrinks the resulting
packfile by 3-5 per-cent.
Note: Porcelain commands such as git gc (see git-gc(1)), git
repack (see git-repack(1)) pass this option by default in modern
Git when they put objects in your repository into pack files. So does git
bundle (see git-bundle(1)) when it creates a bundle.
--threads=<n>
Specifies the number of threads to spawn when
searching for best delta matches. This requires that pack-objects be compiled
with pthreads otherwise this option is ignored with a warning. This is meant
to reduce packing time on multiprocessor machines. The required amount of
memory for the delta search window is however multiplied by the number of
threads. Specifying 0 will cause Git to auto-detect the number of CPU’s
and set the number of threads accordingly.
--index-version=<version>[,<offset>]
This is intended to be used by the test suite
only. It allows to force the version for the generated pack index, and to
force 64-bit index entries on objects located above the given offset.
--keep-true-parents
With this option, parents that are hidden by
grafts are packed nevertheless.
--filter=<filter-spec>
Requires --stdout. Omits certain
objects (usually blobs) from the resulting packfile. See
git-rev-list(1) for valid <filter-spec> forms.
--no-filter
Turns off any previous --filter=
argument.
--missing=<missing-action>
A debug option to help with future
"partial clone" development. This option specifies how missing
objects are handled.
The form --missing=error requests that pack-objects stop with an error if
a missing object is encountered. If the repository is a partial clone, an
attempt to fetch missing objects will be made before declaring them missing.
This is the default action.
The form --missing=allow-any will allow object traversal to continue if a
missing object is encountered. No fetch of a missing object will occur.
Missing objects will silently be omitted from the results.
The form --missing=allow-promisor is like allow-any, but will only
allow object traversal to continue for EXPECTED promisor missing objects. No
fetch of a missing object will occur. An unexpected missing object will raise
an error.
--exclude-promisor-objects
Omit objects that are known to be in the
promisor remote. (This option has the purpose of operating only on locally
created objects, so that when we repack, we still maintain a distinction
between locally created objects [without .promisor] and objects from the
promisor remote [with .promisor].) This is used with partial clone.
--keep-unreachable
Objects unreachable from the refs in packs
named with --unpacked= option are added to the resulting pack, in addition to
the reachable objects that are not in packs marked with *.keep files. This
implies --revs.
--pack-loose-unreachable
Pack unreachable loose objects (and their
loose counterparts removed). This implies --revs.
--unpack-unreachable
Keep unreachable objects in loose form. This
implies --revs.
--delta-islands
Restrict delta matches based on
"islands". See DELTA ISLANDS below.
DELTA ISLANDS
When possible, pack-objects tries to reuse existing on-disk deltas to avoid having to search for new ones on the fly. This is an important optimization for serving fetches, because it means the server can avoid inflating most objects at all and just send the bytes directly from disk. This optimization can’t work when an object is stored as a delta against a base which the receiver does not have (and which we are not already sending). In that case the server "breaks" the delta and has to find a new one, which has a high CPU cost. Therefore it’s important for performance that the set of objects in on-disk delta relationships match what a client would fetch.[pack] island = refs/heads/ island = refs/tags/
[pack] island = refs/virtual/([0-9]+)/heads/ island = refs/virtual/([0-9]+)/tags/ island = refs/virtual/([0-9]+)/(pull)/
CONFIGURATION
Various configuration variables affect packing, see git-config(1) (search for "pack" and "delta").SEE ALSO
git-rev-list(1) git-repack(1) git-prune-packed(1)GIT
Part of the git(1) suite02/28/2023 | Git 2.39.2 |