git-bundle - Move objects and refs by archive
git bundle create [-q | --quiet | --progress | --all-progress] [--all-progress-implied] [--version=<version>] <file> <git-rev-list-args> git bundle verify [-q | --quiet] <file> git bundle list-heads <file> [<refname>...] git bundle unbundle [--progress] <file> [<refname>...]
GIT-BUNDLE(1) Git Manual GIT-BUNDLE(1)
NAME
git-bundle - Move objects and refs by archive
SYNOPSIS
git bundle create [-q | --quiet | --progress | --all-progress] [--all-progress-implied]
[--version=<version>] <file> <git-rev-list-args>
git bundle verify [-q | --quiet] <file>
git bundle list-heads <file> [<refname>...]
git bundle unbundle [--progress] <file> [<refname>...]
DESCRIPTION
Create, unpack, and manipulate "bundle" files. Bundles are used for the
"offline" transfer of Git objects without an active "server" sitting on
the other side of the network connection.
They can be used to create both incremental and full backups of a
repository, and to relay the state of the references in one repository
to another.
Git commands that fetch or otherwise "read" via protocols such as
ssh:// and https:// can also operate on bundle files. It is possible
git-clone(1) a new repository from a bundle, to use git-fetch(1) to
fetch from one, and to list the references contained within it with
git-ls-remote(1). There's no corresponding "write" support, i.e.a git
push into a bundle is not supported.
See the "EXAMPLES" section below for examples of how to use bundles.
BUNDLE FORMAT
Bundles are .pack files (see git-pack-objects(1)) with a header
indicating what references are contained within the bundle.
Like the the packed archive format itself bundles can either be
self-contained, or be created using exclusions. See the "OBJECT
PREREQUISITES" section below.
Bundles created using revision exclusions are "thin packs" created
using the --thin option to git-pack-objects(1), and unbundled using the
--fix-thin option to git-index-pack(1).
There is no option to create a "thick pack" when using revision
exclusions, and users should not be concerned about the difference. By
using "thin packs", bundles created using exclusions are smaller in
size. That they're "thin" under the hood is merely noted here as a
curiosity, and as a reference to other documentation.
See the bundle-format documentation[1] for more details and the
discussion of "thin pack" in the pack format documentation[2] for
further details.
OPTIONS
create [options] <file> <git-rev-list-args>
Used to create a bundle named file. This requires the
<git-rev-list-args> arguments to define the bundle contents.
options contains the options specific to the git bundle create
subcommand.
verify <file>
Used to check that a bundle file is valid and will apply cleanly to
the current repository. This includes checks on the bundle format
itself as well as checking that the prerequisite commits exist and
are fully linked in the current repository. Then, git bundle prints
a list of missing commits, if any. Finally, information about
additional capabilities, such as "object filter", is printed. See
"Capabilities" in link:technical/bundle-format.html for more
information. The exit code is zero for success, but will be nonzero
if the bundle file is invalid.
list-heads <file>
Lists the references defined in the bundle. If followed by a list
of references, only references matching those given are printed
out.
unbundle <file>
Passes the objects in the bundle to git index-pack for storage in
the repository, then prints the names of all defined references. If
a list of references is given, only references matching those in
the list are printed. This command is really plumbing, intended to
be called only by git fetch.
<git-rev-list-args>
A list of arguments, acceptable to git rev-parse and git rev-list
(and containing a named ref, see SPECIFYING REFERENCES below), that
specifies the specific objects and references to transport. For
example, master~10..master causes the current master reference to
be packaged along with all objects added since its 10th ancestor
commit. There is no explicit limit to the number of references and
objects that may be packaged.
[<refname>...]
A list of references used to limit the references reported as
available. This is principally of use to git fetch, which expects
to receive only those references asked for and not necessarily
everything in the pack (in this case, git bundle acts like git
fetch-pack).
--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.
--version=<version>
Specify the bundle version. Version 2 is the older format and can
only be used with SHA-1 repositories; the newer version 3 contains
capabilities that permit extensions. The default is the oldest
supported format, based on the hash algorithm in use.
-q, --quiet
This flag makes the command not to report its progress on the
standard error stream.
SPECIFYING REFERENCES
Revisions must be accompanied by reference names to be packaged in a
bundle.
More than one reference may be packaged, and more than one set of
prerequisite objects can be specified. The objects packaged are those
not contained in the union of the prerequisites.
The git bundle create command resolves the reference names for you
using the same rules as git rev-parse --abbrev-ref=loose. Each
prerequisite can be specified explicitly (e.g. ^master~10), or
implicitly (e.g. master~10..master, --since=10.days.ago master).
All of these simple cases are OK (assuming we have a "master" and
"next" branch):
$ git bundle create master.bundle master
$ echo master | git bundle create master.bundle --stdin
$ git bundle create master-and-next.bundle master next
$ (echo master; echo next) | git bundle create master-and-next.bundle --stdin
And so are these (and the same but omitted --stdin examples):
$ git bundle create recent-master.bundle master~10..master
$ git bundle create recent-updates.bundle master~10..master next~5..next
A revision name or a range whose right-hand-side cannot be resolved to
a reference is not accepted:
$ git bundle create HEAD.bundle $(git rev-parse HEAD)
fatal: Refusing to create empty bundle.
$ git bundle create master-yesterday.bundle master~10..master~5
fatal: Refusing to create empty bundle.
OBJECT PREREQUISITES
When creating bundles it is possible to create a self-contained bundle
that can be unbundled in a repository with no common history, as well
as providing negative revisions to exclude objects needed in the
earlier parts of the history.
Feeding a revision such as new to git bundle create will create a
bundle file that contains all the objects reachable from the revision
new. That bundle can be unbundled in any repository to obtain a full
history that leads to the revision new:
$ git bundle create full.bundle new
A revision range such as old..new will produce a bundle file that will
require the revision old (and any objects reachable from it) to exist
for the bundle to be "unbundle"-able:
$ git bundle create full.bundle old..new
A self-contained bundle without any prerequisites can be extracted into
anywhere, even into an empty repository, or be cloned from (i.e., new,
but not old..new).
It is okay to err on the side of caution, causing the bundle file to
contain objects already in the destination, as these are ignored when
unpacking at the destination.
If you want to match git clone --mirror, which would include your refs
such as refs/remotes/*, use --all. If you want to provide the same set
of refs that a clone directly from the source repository would get, use
--branches --tags for the <git-rev-list-args>.
The git bundle verify command can be used to check whether your
recipient repository has the required prerequisite commits for a
bundle.
EXAMPLES
Assume you want to transfer the history from a repository R1 on machine
A to another repository R2 on machine B. For whatever reason, direct
connection between A and B is not allowed, but we can move data from A
to B via some mechanism (CD, email, etc.). We want to update R2 with
development made on the branch master in R1.
To bootstrap the process, you can first create a bundle that does not
have any prerequisites. You can use a tag to remember up to what commit
you last processed, in order to make it easy to later update the other
repository with an incremental bundle:
machineA$ cd R1
machineA$ git bundle create file.bundle master
machineA$ git tag -f lastR2bundle master
Then you transfer file.bundle to the target machine B. Because this
bundle does not require any existing object to be extracted, you can
create a new repository on machine B by cloning from it:
machineB$ git clone -b master /home/me/tmp/file.bundle R2
This will define a remote called "origin" in the resulting repository
that lets you fetch and pull from the bundle. The $GIT_DIR/config file
in R2 will have an entry like this:
[remote "origin"]
url = /home/me/tmp/file.bundle
fetch = refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
To update the resulting mine.git repository, you can fetch or pull
after replacing the bundle stored at /home/me/tmp/file.bundle with
incremental updates.
After working some more in the original repository, you can create an
incremental bundle to update the other repository:
machineA$ cd R1
machineA$ git bundle create file.bundle lastR2bundle..master
machineA$ git tag -f lastR2bundle master
You then transfer the bundle to the other machine to replace
/home/me/tmp/file.bundle, and pull from it.
machineB$ cd R2
machineB$ git pull
If you know up to what commit the intended recipient repository should
have the necessary objects, you can use that knowledge to specify the
prerequisites, giving a cut-off point to limit the revisions and
objects that go in the resulting bundle. The previous example used the
lastR2bundle tag for this purpose, but you can use any other options
that you would give to the git-log(1) command. Here are more examples:
You can use a tag that is present in both:
$ git bundle create mybundle v1.0.0..master
You can use a prerequisite based on time:
$ git bundle create mybundle --since=10.days master
You can use the number of commits:
$ git bundle create mybundle -10 master
You can run git-bundle verify to see if you can extract from a bundle
that was created with a prerequisite:
$ git bundle verify mybundle
This will list what commits you must have in order to extract from the
bundle and will error out if you do not have them.
A bundle from a recipient repository's point of view is just like a
regular repository which it fetches or pulls from. You can, for
example, map references when fetching:
$ git fetch mybundle master:localRef
You can also see what references it offers:
$ git ls-remote mybundle
GIT
Part of the git(1) suite
NOTES
1. the bundle-format documentation
git-htmldocs/technical/bundle-format.html
2. the pack format documentation
git-htmldocs/technical/pack-format.html
Git 2.36.0 04/17/2022 GIT-BUNDLE(1)