focal (1) git-sparse-checkout.1.gz

NAME

       git-sparse-checkout - Initialize and modify the sparse-checkout configuration, which reduces the checkout
       to a set of paths given by a list of patterns.

SYNOPSIS

       git sparse-checkout <subcommand> [options]

DESCRIPTION

       Initialize and modify the sparse-checkout configuration, which reduces the checkout to a set of paths
       given by a list of patterns.

       THIS COMMAND IS EXPERIMENTAL. ITS BEHAVIOR, AND THE BEHAVIOR OF OTHER COMMANDS IN THE PRESENCE OF
       SPARSE-CHECKOUTS, WILL LIKELY CHANGE IN THE FUTURE.

COMMANDS

       list
           Describe the patterns in the sparse-checkout file.

       init
           Enable the core.sparseCheckout setting. If the sparse-checkout file does not exist, then populate it
           with patterns that match every file in the root directory and no other directories, then will remove
           all directories tracked by Git. Add patterns to the sparse-checkout file to repopulate the working
           directory.

           To avoid interfering with other worktrees, it first enables the extensions.worktreeConfig setting and
           makes sure to set the core.sparseCheckout setting in the worktree-specific config file.

       set
           Write a set of patterns to the sparse-checkout file, as given as a list of arguments following the
           set subcommand. Update the working directory to match the new patterns. Enable the
           core.sparseCheckout config setting if it is not already enabled.

           When the --stdin option is provided, the patterns are read from standard in as a newline-delimited
           list instead of from the arguments.

       disable
           Disable the core.sparseCheckout config setting, and restore the working directory to include all
           files. Leaves the sparse-checkout file intact so a later git sparse-checkout init command may return
           the working directory to the same state.

SPARSE CHECKOUT

       "Sparse checkout" allows populating the working directory sparsely. It uses the skip-worktree bit (see
       git-update-index(1)) to tell Git whether a file in the working directory is worth looking at. If the
       skip-worktree bit is set, then the file is ignored in the working directory. Git will not populate the
       contents of those files, which makes a sparse checkout helpful when working in a repository with many
       files, but only a few are important to the current user.

       The $GIT_DIR/info/sparse-checkout file is used to define the skip-worktree reference bitmap. When Git
       updates the working directory, it updates the skip-worktree bits in the index based on this file. The
       files matching the patterns in the file will appear in the working directory, and the rest will not.

       To enable the sparse-checkout feature, run git sparse-checkout init to initialize a simple
       sparse-checkout file and enable the core.sparseCheckout config setting. Then, run git sparse-checkout set
       to modify the patterns in the sparse-checkout file.

       To repopulate the working directory with all files, use the git sparse-checkout disable command.

FULL PATTERN SET

       By default, the sparse-checkout file uses the same syntax as .gitignore files.

       While $GIT_DIR/info/sparse-checkout is usually used to specify what files are included, you can also
       specify what files are not included, using negative patterns. For example, to remove the file unwanted:

           /*
           !unwanted

CONE PATTERN SET

       The full pattern set allows for arbitrary pattern matches and complicated inclusion/exclusion rules.
       These can result in O(N*M) pattern matches when updating the index, where N is the number of patterns and
       M is the number of paths in the index. To combat this performance issue, a more restricted pattern set is
       allowed when core.spareCheckoutCone is enabled.

       The accepted patterns in the cone pattern set are:

        1. Recursive: All paths inside a directory are included.

        2. Parent: All files immediately inside a directory are included.

       In addition to the above two patterns, we also expect that all files in the root directory are included.
       If a recursive pattern is added, then all leading directories are added as parent patterns.

       By default, when running git sparse-checkout init, the root directory is added as a parent pattern. At
       this point, the sparse-checkout file contains the following patterns:

           /*
           !/*/

       This says "include everything in root, but nothing two levels below root." If we then add the folder
       A/B/C as a recursive pattern, the folders A and A/B are added as parent patterns. The resulting
       sparse-checkout file is now

           /*
           !/*/
           /A/
           !/A/*/
           /A/B/
           !/A/B/*/
           /A/B/C/

       Here, order matters, so the negative patterns are overridden by the positive patterns that appear lower
       in the file.

       If core.sparseCheckoutCone=true, then Git will parse the sparse-checkout file expecting patterns of these
       types. Git will warn if the patterns do not match. If the patterns do match the expected format, then Git
       will use faster hash- based algorithms to compute inclusion in the sparse-checkout.

       In the cone mode case, the git sparse-checkout list subcommand will list the directories that define the
       recursive patterns. For the example sparse-checkout file above, the output is as follows:

           $ git sparse-checkout list
           A/B/C

       If core.ignoreCase=true, then the pattern-matching algorithm will use a case-insensitive check. This
       corrects for case mismatched filenames in the git sparse-checkout set command to reflect the expected
       cone in the working directory.

SUBMODULES

       If your repository contains one or more submodules, then those submodules will appear based on which you
       initialized with the git submodule command. If your sparse-checkout patterns exclude an initialized
       submodule, then that submodule will still appear in your working directory.

SEE ALSO

       git-read-tree(1) gitignore(5)

GIT

       Part of the git(1) suite