1git repository layout 2===================== 3 4You may find these things in your git repository (`.git` 5directory for a repository associated with your working tree, or 6`'project'.git` directory for a public 'bare' repository). 7 8objects:: 9 Object store associated with this repository. Usually 10 an object store is self sufficient (i.e. all the objects 11 that are referred to by an object found in it are also 12 found in it), but there are couple of ways to violate 13 it. 14+ 15. You could populate the repository by running a commit walker 16without `-a` option. Depending on which options are given, you 17could have only commit objects without associated blobs and 18trees this way, for example. A repository with this kind of 19incomplete object store is not suitable to be published to the 20outside world but sometimes useful for private repository. 21. You also could have an incomplete but locally usable repository 22by cloning shallowly. See gitlink:git-clone[1]. 23. You can be using `objects/info/alternates` mechanism, or 24`$GIT_ALTERNATE_OBJECT_DIRECTORIES` mechanism to 'borrow' 25objects from other object stores. A repository with this kind 26of incomplete object store is not suitable to be published for 27use with dumb transports but otherwise is OK as long as 28`objects/info/alternates` points at the right object stores 29it borrows from. 30 31objects/[0-9a-f][0-9a-f]:: 32 Traditionally, each object is stored in its own file. 33 They are split into 256 subdirectories using the first 34 two letters from its object name to keep the number of 35 directory entries `objects` directory itself needs to 36 hold. Objects found here are often called 'unpacked' 37 (or 'loose') objects. 38 39objects/pack:: 40 Packs (files that store many object in compressed form, 41 along with index files to allow them to be randomly 42 accessed) are found in this directory. 43 44objects/info:: 45 Additional information about the object store is 46 recorded in this directory. 47 48objects/info/packs:: 49 This file is to help dumb transports discover what packs 50 are available in this object store. Whenever a pack is 51 added or removed, `git update-server-info` should be run 52 to keep this file up-to-date if the repository is 53 published for dumb transports. `git repack` does this 54 by default. 55 56objects/info/alternates:: 57 This file records paths to alternate object stores that 58 this object store borrows objects from, one pathname per 59 line. Note that not only native Git tools use it locally, 60 but the HTTP fetcher also tries to use it remotely; this 61 will usually work if you have relative paths (relative 62 to the object database, not to the repository!) in your 63 alternates file, but it will not work if you use absolute 64 paths unless the absolute path in filesystem and web URL 65 is the same. See also 'objects/info/http-alternates'. 66 67objects/info/http-alternates:: 68 This file records URLs to alternate object stores that 69 this object store borrows objects from, to be used when 70 the repository is fetched over HTTP. 71 72refs:: 73 References are stored in subdirectories of this 74 directory. The `git prune` command knows to keep 75 objects reachable from refs found in this directory and 76 its subdirectories. 77 78refs/heads/`name`:: 79 records tip-of-the-tree commit objects of branch `name` 80 81refs/tags/`name`:: 82 records any object name (not necessarily a commit 83 object, or a tag object that points at a commit object). 84 85refs/remotes/`name`:: 86 records tip-of-the-tree commit objects of branches copied 87 from a remote repository. 88 89packed-refs:: 90 records the same information as refs/heads/, refs/tags/, 91 and friends record in a more efficient way. See 92 gitlink:git-pack-refs[1]. 93 94HEAD:: 95 A symref (see glossary) to the `refs/heads/` namespace 96 describing the currently active branch. It does not mean 97 much if the repository is not associated with any working tree 98 (i.e. a 'bare' repository), but a valid git repository 99 *must* have the HEAD file; some porcelains may use it to 100 guess the designated "default" branch of the repository 101 (usually 'master'). It is legal if the named branch 102 'name' does not (yet) exist. In some legacy setups, it is 103 a symbolic link instead of a symref that points at the current 104 branch. 105+ 106HEAD can also record a specific commit directly, instead of 107being a symref to point at the current branch. Such a state 108is often called 'detached HEAD', and almost all commands work 109identically as normal. See gitlink:git-checkout[1] for 110details. 111 112branches:: 113 A slightly deprecated way to store shorthands to be used 114 to specify URL to `git fetch`, `git pull` and `git push` 115 commands is to store a file in `branches/'name'` and 116 give 'name' to these commands in place of 'repository' 117 argument. 118 119hooks:: 120 Hooks are customization scripts used by various git 121 commands. A handful of sample hooks are installed when 122 `git init` is run, but all of them are disabled by 123 default. To enable, they need to be made executable. 124 Read link:hooks.html[hooks] for more details about 125 each hook. 126 127index:: 128 The current index file for the repository. It is 129 usually not found in a bare repository. 130 131info:: 132 Additional information about the repository is recorded 133 in this directory. 134 135info/refs:: 136 This file is to help dumb transports to discover what 137 refs are available in this repository. Whenever you 138 create/delete a new branch or a new tag, `git 139 update-server-info` should be run to keep this file 140 up-to-date if the repository is published for dumb 141 transports. The `git-receive-pack` command, which is 142 run on a remote repository when you `git push` into it, 143 runs `hooks/update` hook to help you achieve this. 144 145info/grafts:: 146 This file records fake commit ancestry information, to 147 pretend the set of parents a commit has is different 148 from how the commit was actually created. One record 149 per line describes a commit and its fake parents by 150 listing their 40-byte hexadecimal object names separated 151 by a space and terminated by a newline. 152 153info/exclude:: 154 This file, by convention among Porcelains, stores the 155 exclude pattern list. `.gitignore` is the per-directory 156 ignore file. `git status`, `git add`, `git rm` and `git 157 clean` look at it but the core git commands do not look 158 at it. See also: gitlink:git-ls-files[1] `--exclude-from` 159 and `--exclude-per-directory`. 160 161remotes:: 162 Stores shorthands to be used to give URL and default 163 refnames to interact with remote repository to `git 164 fetch`, `git pull` and `git push` commands. 165 166logs:: 167 Records of changes made to refs are stored in this 168 directory. See the documentation on git-update-ref 169 for more information. 170 171logs/refs/heads/`name`:: 172 Records all changes made to the branch tip named `name`. 173 174logs/refs/tags/`name`:: 175 Records all changes made to the tag named `name`. 176 177shallow:: 178 This is similar to `info/grafts` but is internally used 179 and maintained by shallow clone mechanism. See `--depth` 180 option to gitlink:git-clone[1] and gitlink:git-fetch[1]. 181