git-new-workdir for filesystems without links (e.g. FAT32)?

git-new-workdir for filesystems without links (e.g. FAT32)?

[Piotr Krukowiecki]

Hi, 

git-new-workdir requires soft links to work, so obviously it will fail if file 
system does not support them. Is there any other way for having multiple working 
dirs with one repository?

Since git-new-workdir just uses soft links it should be possible to implement it 
natively in git. Maybe there some patches for this?

I need it because I'm using FAT32 on my dual-boot computer to share data between 
windows and linux. 


Thanks,

-- 
Piotr Krukowiecki

Re: git-new-workdir for filesystems without links (e.g. FAT32)?

[Jonathan Nieder]

Hi Piotr,

Piotr Krukowiecki wrote:

> git-new-workdir requires soft links to work, so obviously it will fail if file 
> system does not support them. Is there any other way for having multiple working 
> dirs with one repository?

I assume you mean a way to share refs between repositories without
using symlinks?  Then alas, that is not implemented, though there
is some interest.  See [1] for details.

It should not be impossible, I think --- something for refs analagous
to the ".git file" mechanism might make perfect sense (see
v1.5.6-rc0~93^2~3, Add platform-independent .git "symlink", 2008-02-20
and "git log --grep='git file'" to see development since then).  The
main distinction here is that the target of a refs "symlink" should
also be aware of it, to avoid garbage collecting the shared objects.

If on the other hand you just want to share objects (not refs) between
repositories, the GIT_OBJECT_DIRECTORY environment variable might
help.

Good luck,
Jonathan

[1] http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.version-control.git/150559/focus=150693

Re: git-new-workdir for filesystems without links (e.g. FAT32)?

[Piotr Krukowiecki]

On Sun, Feb 6, 2011 at 8:14 PM, Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Piotr,
>
> Piotr Krukowiecki wrote:
>
>> git-new-workdir requires soft links to work, so obviously it will fail if file
>> system does not support them. Is there any other way for having multiple working
>> dirs with one repository?
>
> I assume you mean a way to share refs between repositories without
> using symlinks?  Then alas, that is not implemented, though there
> is some interest.  See [1] for details.
[...]
> If on the other hand you just want to share objects (not refs) between
> repositories, the GIT_OBJECT_DIRECTORY environment variable might
> help.

I need several working directories (for different branches). I wanted
to use git-new-workdir because, as I understand, I could do 'git svn
fetch' only once and then 'git rebase' for each working dir. So the
only reason was performance (network and disk).

I don't know if sharing objects is enough. If I understand correctly,
if a fetch introduces e.g. new branches, then only one working
directory will have information about them?


-- 
Piotrek