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We have two different repacking strategies in Git:
- The "gc" strategy uses git-gc(1).
- The "incremental" strategy uses multi-pack indices and `git
multi-pack-index repack` to merge together smaller packfiles as
determined by a specific batch size.
The former strategy is our old and trusted default, whereas the latter
has historically been used for our scheduled maintenance. But both
strategies have their shortcomings:
- The "gc" strategy performs regular all-into-one repacks. Furthermore
it is rather inflexible, as it is not easily possible for a user to
enable or disable specific subtasks.
- The "incremental" strategy is not a full replacement for the "gc"
strategy as it doesn't know to prune stale data.
So today, we don't have a strategy that is well-suited for large repos
while being a full replacement for the "gc" strategy.
Introduce a new "geometric" strategy that aims to fill this gap. This
strategy invokes all the usual cleanup tasks that git-gc(1) does like
pruning reflogs and rerere caches as well as stale worktrees. But where
it differs from both the "gc" and "incremental" strategy is that it uses
our geometric repacking infrastructure exposed by git-repack(1) to
repack packfiles. The advantage of geometric repacking is that we only
need to perform an all-into-one repack when the object count in a repo
has grown significantly.
One downside of this strategy is that pruning of unreferenced objects is
not going to happen regularly anymore. Every geometric repack knows to
soak up all loose objects regardless of their reachability, and merging
two or more packs doesn't consider reachability, either. Consequently,
the number of unreachable objects will grow over time.
This is remedied by doing an all-into-one repack instead of a geometric
repack whenever we determine that the geometric repack would end up
merging all packfiles anyway. This all-into-one repack then performs our
usual reachability checks and writes unreachable objects into a cruft
pack. As cruft packs won't ever be merged during geometric repacks we
can thus phase out these objects over time.
Of course, this still means that we retain unreachable objects for far
longer than with the "gc" strategy. But the maintenance strategy is
intended especially for large repositories, where the basic assumption
is that the set of unreachable objects will be significantly dwarfed by
the number of reachable objects.
If this assumption is ever proven to be too disadvantageous we could for
example introduce a time-based strategy: if the largest packfile has not
been touched for longer than $T, we perform an all-into-one repack. But
for now, such a mechanism is deferred into the future as it is not clear
yet whether it is needed in the first place.
Signed-off-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Acked-by: Taylor Blau <me@ttaylorr.com>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Git - fast, scalable, distributed revision control system
Git is a fast, scalable, distributed revision control system with an unusually rich command set that provides both high-level operations and full access to internals.
Git is an Open Source project covered by the GNU General Public License version 2 (some parts of it are under different licenses, compatible with the GPLv2). It was originally written by Linus Torvalds with help of a group of hackers around the net.
Please read the file INSTALL for installation instructions.
Many Git online resources are accessible from https://git-scm.com/ including full documentation and Git related tools.
See Documentation/gittutorial.adoc to get started, then see
Documentation/giteveryday.adoc for a useful minimum set of commands, and
Documentation/git-<commandname>.adoc for documentation of each command.
If git has been correctly installed, then the tutorial can also be
read with man gittutorial or git help tutorial, and the
documentation of each command with man git-<commandname> or git help <commandname>.
CVS users may also want to read Documentation/gitcvs-migration.adoc
(man gitcvs-migration or git help cvs-migration if git is
installed).
The user discussion and development of Git take place on the Git mailing list -- everyone is welcome to post bug reports, feature requests, comments and patches to git@vger.kernel.org (read Documentation/SubmittingPatches for instructions on patch submission and Documentation/CodingGuidelines).
Those wishing to help with error message, usage and informational message
string translations (localization l10) should see po/README.md
(a po file is a Portable Object file that holds the translations).
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Issues which are security relevant should be disclosed privately to the Git Security mailing list git-security@googlegroups.com.
The maintainer frequently sends the "What's cooking" reports that list the current status of various development topics to the mailing list. The discussion following them give a good reference for project status, development direction and remaining tasks.
The name "git" was given by Linus Torvalds when he wrote the very first version. He described the tool as "the stupid content tracker" and the name as (depending on your mood):
- random three-letter combination that is pronounceable, and not actually used by any common UNIX command. The fact that it is a mispronunciation of "get" may or may not be relevant.
- stupid. contemptible and despicable. simple. Take your pick from the dictionary of slang.
- "global information tracker": you're in a good mood, and it actually works for you. Angels sing, and a light suddenly fills the room.
- "goddamn idiotic truckload of sh*t": when it breaks