1GIT-BUNDLE(1) Git Manual GIT-BUNDLE(1)
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6 git-bundle - Move objects and refs by archive
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9 git bundle create <file> <git-rev-list-args>
10 git bundle verify <file>
11 git bundle list-heads <file> [<refname>...]
12 git bundle unbundle <file> [<refname>...]
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16 Some workflows require that one or more branches of development on one
17 machine be replicated on another machine, but the two machines cannot
18 be directly connected, and therefore the interactive Git protocols
19 (git, ssh, http) cannot be used. This command provides support for git
20 fetch and git pull to operate by packaging objects and references in an
21 archive at the originating machine, then importing those into another
22 repository using git fetch and git pull after moving the archive by
23 some means (e.g., by sneakernet). As no direct connection between the
24 repositories exists, the user must specify a basis for the bundle that
25 is held by the destination repository: the bundle assumes that all
26 objects in the basis are already in the destination repository.
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29 create <file>
30 Used to create a bundle named file. This requires the
31 git-rev-list-args arguments to define the bundle contents.
32 verify <file>
34 Used to check that a bundle file is valid and will apply cleanly to
35 the current repository. This includes checks on the bundle format
36 itself as well as checking that the prerequisite commits exist and
37 are fully linked in the current repository. git bundle prints a
38 list of missing commits, if any, and exits with a non-zero status.
39 list-heads <file>
41 Lists the references defined in the bundle. If followed by a list
42 of references, only references matching those given are printed
43 out.
44 unbundle <file>
46 Passes the objects in the bundle to git index-pack for storage in
47 the repository, then prints the names of all defined references. If
48 a list of references is given, only references matching those in
49 the list are printed. This command is really plumbing, intended to
50 be called only by git fetch.
51 <git-rev-list-args>
53 A list of arguments, acceptable to git rev-parse and git rev-list
54 (and containing a named ref, see SPECIFYING REFERENCES below), that
55 specifies the specific objects and references to transport. For
56 example, master~10..master causes the current master reference to
57 be packaged along with all objects added since its 10th ancestor
58 commit. There is no explicit limit to the number of references and
59 objects that may be packaged.
60 [<refname>...]
62 A list of references used to limit the references reported as
63 available. This is principally of use to git fetch, which expects
64 to receive only those references asked for and not necessarily
65 everything in the pack (in this case, git bundle acts like git
66 fetch-pack).
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69 git bundle will only package references that are shown by git show-ref:
70 this includes heads, tags, and remote heads. References such as
71 master~1 cannot be packaged, but are perfectly suitable for defining
72 the basis. More than one reference may be packaged, and more than one
73 basis can be specified. The objects packaged are those not contained in
74 the union of the given bases. Each basis can be specified explicitly
75 (e.g. ^master~10), or implicitly (e.g. master~10..master,
76 --since=10.days.ago master).
77 It is very important that the basis used be held by the destination. It
79 is okay to err on the side of caution, causing the bundle file to
80 contain objects already in the destination, as these are ignored when
81 unpacking at the destination.
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84 Assume you want to transfer the history from a repository R1 on machine
85 A to another repository R2 on machine B. For whatever reason, direct
86 connection between A and B is not allowed, but we can move data from A
87 to B via some mechanism (CD, email, etc.). We want to update R2 with
88 development made on the branch master in R1.
89 To bootstrap the process, you can first create a bundle that does not
91 have any basis. You can use a tag to remember up to what commit you
92 last processed, in order to make it easy to later update the other
93 repository with an incremental bundle:
94 machineA$ cd R1
96 machineA$ git bundle create file.bundle master
97 machineA$ git tag -f lastR2bundle master
98 Then you transfer file.bundle to the target machine B. Because this
101 bundle does not require any existing object to be extracted, you can
102 create a new repository on machine B by cloning from it:
103 machineB$ git clone -b master /home/me/tmp/file.bundle R2
105 This will define a remote called "origin" in the resulting repository
108 that lets you fetch and pull from the bundle. The $GIT_DIR/config file
109 in R2 will have an entry like this:
110 [remote "origin"]
112 url = /home/me/tmp/file.bundle
113 fetch = refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
114 To update the resulting mine.git repository, you can fetch or pull
117 after replacing the bundle stored at /home/me/tmp/file.bundle with
118 incremental updates.
119 After working some more in the original repository, you can create an
121 incremental bundle to update the other repository:
122 machineA$ cd R1
124 machineA$ git bundle create file.bundle lastR2bundle..master
125 machineA$ git tag -f lastR2bundle master
126 You then transfer the bundle to the other machine to replace
129 /home/me/tmp/file.bundle, and pull from it.
130 machineB$ cd R2
132 machineB$ git pull
133 If you know up to what commit the intended recipient repository should
136 have the necessary objects, you can use that knowledge to specify the
137 basis, giving a cut-off point to limit the revisions and objects that
138 go in the resulting bundle. The previous example used the lastR2bundle
139 tag for this purpose, but you can use any other options that you would
140 give to the git-log(1) command. Here are more examples:
141 You can use a tag that is present in both:
143 $ git bundle create mybundle v1.0.0..master
145 You can use a basis based on time:
148 $ git bundle create mybundle --since=10.days master
150 You can use the number of commits:
153 $ git bundle create mybundle -10 master
155 You can run git-bundle verify to see if you can extract from a bundle
158 that was created with a basis:
159 $ git bundle verify mybundle
161 This will list what commits you must have in order to extract from the
164 bundle and will error out if you do not have them.
165 A bundle from a recipient repository’s point of view is just like a
167 regular repository which it fetches or pulls from. You can, for
168 example, map references when fetching:
169 $ git fetch mybundle master:localRef
171 You can also see what references it offers:
174 $ git ls-remote mybundle
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179 Part of the git(1) suite
180Git 2.20.1 12/15/2018 GIT-BUNDLE(1)