Re: Why repository grows after "git gc"? / Purpose of *.keep files?

[Mike Hommey <mh@glandium.org>]

On Mon, May 12, 2008 at 11:24:14PM +0300, Teemu Likonen wrote:
> But I have experienced the same earlier with some other post-1.5.5
> version so I believe you can reproduce this yourself. After cloning
> Linus's linux-2.6 repo its .git directory weights 209MB. After single
> "git pull" and "git gc" it was 298MB in my test.

I noticed that a while ago: when repacking multiple packs when one has a
.keep file, the resulting additional pack contains too many blobs and
trees, contrary to when only packing loose objects:

$ git init
$ echo a > a; git add a; git commit -m a
$ git gc
Counting objects: 3, done.
Writing objects: 100% (3/3), done.
Total 3 (delta 0), reused 0 (delta 0)
$ git verify-pack -v .git/objects/pack/pack-b87e61e2dc18ff37624d7f996f1270f923411530.pack
4bba7c0583de30efff4097299f89b199ab4a6dff commit 160 116 12
78981922613b2afb6025042ff6bd878ac1994e85 blob   2 11 167
aaff74984cccd156a469afa7d9ab10e4777beb24 tree   29 39 128
.git/objects/pack/pack-b87e61e2dc18ff37624d7f996f1270f923411530.pack: ok

$ touch .git/objects/pack/pack-b87e61e2dc18ff37624d7f996f1270f923411530.keep
$ echo b > b; git add b; git commit -m b
$ git gc
Counting objects: 3, done.
Compressing objects: 100% (2/2), done.
Writing objects: 100% (3/3), done.
Total 3 (delta 0), reused 0 (delta 0)
$ git verify-pack -v
.git/objects/pack/pack-aa817046e43f278d67c6b85962676246f57bb855.pack
3683f870be446c7cc05ffaef9fa06415276e1828 tree   58 65 158
61780798228d17af2d34fce4cfbdf35556832472 blob   2 11 223
647aed0360e964adc5cedb12e0719fb8bfc05867 commit 208 146 12
.git/objects/pack/pack-aa817046e43f278d67c6b85962676246f57bb855.pack: ok

$ git gc
Counting objects: 4, done.
Compressing objects: 100% (2/2), done.
Writing objects: 100% (4/4), done.
Total 4 (delta 0), reused 4 (delta 0)
$ git verify-pack -v
.git/objects/pack/pack-5f692a665e062dedad7b4baf692517adec37899d.pack
3683f870be446c7cc05ffaef9fa06415276e1828 tree   58 65 158
61780798228d17af2d34fce4cfbdf35556832472 blob   2 11 234
647aed0360e964adc5cedb12e0719fb8bfc05867 commit 208 146 12
78981922613b2afb6025042ff6bd878ac1994e85 blob   2 11 223
.git/objects/pack/pack-5f692a665e062dedad7b4baf692517adec37899d.pack: ok

Mike