Git Symlinks in Windows

Question

Our developers use a mix of Windows and Unix based OS s  Therefore  symlinks created on Unix machines become a problem for Windows developers  In windows  msysgit   the symlink is converted to a text file with a path to the file it points to  Instead  I d like to convert the symlink into an actual Windows symlink   The  updated  solution I have to this is    Write a post-checkout script that will recursively look for  symlink  text files  Replace them with windows symlink  using mklink  with same name and extension as dummy  symlink  Ignore these windows symlink by adding entry into  git info exclude    I have not implemented this  but I believe this is a solid approach to this problem     Questions    What  if any  downsides do you see to this approach  Is this post-checkout script even implementable   i e  can I recursively find out the dummy  symlink  files git creates  Has anybody already worked on such script

User · Answer

I just tried with Git 2 30 0  released 2020-12-28   This is NOT a full answer but a few useful tidbits nonetheless   Feel free to cannibalize for your own answer   There s a documentation link when installing Git for Windows  This link takes you here  https   github com git-for-windows git wiki Symbolic-Links And this is quite a longish discussion  Also symbolic links keep popping up in the release notes  As of 2 30 0 this here is still listed as a  quot Known issue quot    On Windows 10 before 1703  or when Developer Mode is turned off  special permissions are required when cloning repositories with symbolic links  therefore support for symbolic links is disabled by default  Use git clone -c core symlinks true  lt URL gt  to enable it  see details here

User · Answer

One simple trick we use is to just call git add --all twice in a row   For example  our Windows 7 commit script calls     git add --all   git add --all   The first add treats the link as text and adds the folders for delete   The second add traverses the link correctly and undoes the delete by restoring the files     It s less elegant than some of the other proposed solutions but it is a simple fix to some of our legacy environments that got symlinks added

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Short answer  They are now supported nicely  if you can enable developer mode   From https   blogs windows com buildingapps 2016 12 02 symlinks-windows-10      Now in Windows 10 Creators Update  a user  with admin rights  can   first enable Developer Mode  and then any user on the machine can run   the mklink command without elevating a command-line console       What drove this change  The availability and use of symlinks is a big   deal to modern developers       Many popular development tools like git and package managers like npm   recognize and persist symlinks when creating repos or packages    respectively  When those repos or packages are then restored   elsewhere  the symlinks are also restored  ensuring disk space  and   the user   s time  isn   t wasted    Easy to overlook with all the other announcements of the  Creator s update   but if you enable Developer Mode  you can create symlinks without elevated privileges  You might have to re-install git and make sure symlink support is enabled  as it s not by default

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I use sym links all the time between my document root and git repo directory  I like to keep them separate  On windows I use mklink  j option  The junction seems to let git behave normally    gt mklink  j  lt location path  of link gt   lt source of link gt   for example    gt mklink  j c  gitRepos Posts C  Bitnami wamp apache2 htdocs Posts

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I would suggest you don t use symlinks within the repo   Store the actual content inside the repo  and then place symlinks out side the repo  that point to the content   So lets say you are using a repo  to compare hosting your site on  nix with hosting on win  Store the content in your repo   lets say  httpRepoContent and c  httpRepoContent with this being the folder that is synced via GIT  SVN etc   Then  replace the content folder of you web server   var www and c  program files web server www  names don t really matter  edit if you must   with a symbolic link to the content in your repo   The web servers will see the content as actually in the  right  place  but you get to use your source control   However  if you need to use symlinks with in the repo   you will need to look into something like some sort of pre post commit scripts  I know you can use them to do things  such as parse code files through a formatter for example  so it should be possible to convert the symlinks between platforms    if any one knows a good place to learn how to do these scripts for the common source controls  SVN GIT MG  then please do add a comment

User · Answer

You can find the symlinks by looking for files that have a mode of 120000  possibly with this command   git ls-files -s   awk   120000  print  4     Once you replace the links  I would recommend marking them as unchanged with git update-index --assume-unchanged  rather than listing them in  git info exclude

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For those using CygWin on Vista  Win7  or above  the native git command can create  proper  symlinks that are recognized by Windows apps such as Android Studio   You just need to set the CYGWIN environment variable to include winsymlinks native or winsymlinks nativestrict as such   export CYGWIN   CYGWIN winsymlinks native    The downside to this  and a significant one at that  is that the CygWin shell has to be  Run as Administrator  in order for it to have the OS permissions required to create those kind of symlinks   Once they re created  though  no special permissions are required to use them   As long they aren t changed in the repository by another developer  git thereafter runs fine with normal user permissions   Personally  I use this only for symlinks that are navigated by Windows apps  i e  non-CygWin  because of this added difficulty   For more information on this option  see this SO question  How to make symbolic link with cygwin in Windows 7

User · Answer

I was asking this exact same question a while back  not here  just in general  and ended up coming up with a very similar solution to OP s proposition  First I ll provide direct answers to questions 1 2  amp  3  and then I ll post the solution I ended up using    There are indeed a few downsides to the proposed solution  mainly regarding an increased potential for repository pollution  or accidentally adding duplicate files while they re in their  Windows symlink  states   More on this under  limitations  below   Yes  a post-checkout script is implementable  Maybe not as a literal post-git checkout step  but the solution below has met my needs well enough that a literal post-checkout script wasn t necessary  Yes    The Solution   Our developers are in much the same situation as OP s  a mixture of Windows and Unix-like hosts  repositories and submodules with many git symlinks  and no native support  yet  in the release version of MsysGit for intelligently handling these symlinks on Windows hosts   Thanks to Josh Lee for pointing out the fact that git commits symlinks with special filemode 120000  With this information it s possible to add a few git aliases that allow for the creation and manipulation of git symlinks on Windows hosts    Creating git symlinks on Windows  git config --global alias add-symlink       cat  lt  lt  ETX    git add symlink       if      -ne 2          1     -h     then     printf   b n             usage  git add-symlink  lt source file or dir gt   lt target symlink gt  n             Create a symlink in a git repository on a Windows host  n             Note  source MUST be a path relative to the location of target          1     -h     amp  amp  return 0    return 2   fi    source file or dir   1       source file or dir   source file or dir       target symlink   2       target symlink   target symlink      target symlink    GIT PREFIX   target symlink     target symlink   target symlink            target symlink         if   -d   target symlink     then     target symlink    target symlink      source file or dir         fi    case   target symlink  in           target dir   target symlink                target dir  GIT PREFIX      esac    target dir   cd   target dir   amp  amp  pwd     if     -e    target dir    source file or dir      then     printf  error  git-add-symlink   s  No such file or directory n               target dir    source file or dir    gt  amp 2     printf   Source MUST be a path relative to the location of target   n   gt  amp 2     return 2   fi    git update-index --add --cacheinfo 120000            printf   s    source file or dir    git hash-object -w --stdin              target symlink          amp  amp  git checkout --   target symlink         amp  amp  printf   s - gt   s n     target symlink  GIT PREFIX     source file or dir           return        git add symlink ETX      Usage  git add-symlink  lt source file or dir gt   lt target symlink gt   where the argument corresponding to the source file or directory must take the form of a path relative to the target symlink  You can use this alias the same way you would normally use ln   E g   the repository tree   dir  dir foo  dir foo bar  dir foo bar baz       file containing  I am baz   dir foo bar lnk file  symlink to          file  file                  file containing  I am file   lnk bar               symlink to dir foo bar     Can be created on Windows as follows   git init mkdir -p dir foo bar  echo  I am baz   gt  dir foo bar baz echo  I am file   gt  file git add -A git commit -m  Add files  git add-symlink          file dir foo bar lnk file git add-symlink dir foo bar  lnk bar git commit -m  Add symlinks   Replacing git symlinks with NTFS hardlinks junctions  git config --global alias rm-symlinks       cat  lt  lt  ETX    git rm symlinks       case   1  in  -h      printf  usage  git rm-symlinks  symlink   symlink        n      return 0   esac   ppid      case    in      0  git ls-files -s   grep -E   120000    cut -f2            printf   s n            esac   while IFS  read -r symlink  do     case   symlink  in             symdir   symlink                  symdir          esac      git checkout --   symlink      src    symdir    cat   symlink         posix to dos sed  s      A-Za-z     1   s        g      doslnk   printf   s n    symlink    sed   posix to dos sed       dossrc   printf   s n    src    sed   posix to dos sed        if   -f   src     then       rm -f   symlink        cmd   C mklink   H   doslnk    dossrc      elif   -d   src     then       rm -f   symlink        cmd   C mklink   J   doslnk    dossrc      else       printf  error  git-rm-symlink  Not a valid source n   gt  amp 2       printf   s     gt   s    s     gt   s     n                symlink    src    doslnk    dossrc   gt  amp 2       false     fi    printf  ESC  d    d n    ppid            git update-index --assume-unchanged   symlink    done   awk       BEGIN   status code   0         ESC     ppid          status code    2   next         print       END   exit status code           git rm symlinks ETX     git config --global alias rm-symlink   git rm-symlinks     for back-compat    Usage   git rm-symlinks  symlink   symlink          This alias can remove git symlinks one-by-one or all-at-once in one fell swoop  Symlinks will be replaced with NTFS hardlinks  in the case of files  or NTFS junctions  in the case of directories   The benefit of using hardlinks junctions over  true  NTFS symlinks is that elevated UAC permissions are not required in order for them to be created   To remove symlinks from submodules  just use git s built-in support for iterating over them   git submodule foreach --recursive git rm-symlinks   But  for every drastic action like this  a reversal is nice to have    Restoring git symlinks on Windows  git config --global alias checkout-symlinks       cat  lt  lt  ETX    git checkout symlinks       case   1  in  -h      printf  usage  git checkout-symlinks  symlink   symlink        n      return 0   esac   case    in      0  git ls-files -s   grep -E   120000    cut -f2            printf   s n            esac   while IFS  read -r symlink  do     git update-index --no-assume-unchanged   symlink      rmdir   symlink   gt  dev null 2 gt  amp 1     git checkout --   symlink      printf  Restored git symlink   s - gt   s n    symlink     cat   symlink      done     git checkout symlinks ETX     git config --global alias co-symlinks   git checkout-symlinks    Usage  git checkout-symlinks  symlink   symlink         which undoes git rm-symlinks  effectively restoring the repository to its natural state  except for your changes  which should stay intact    And for submodules   git submodule foreach --recursive git checkout-symlinks  Limitations    Directories files symlinks with spaces in their paths should work  But tabs or newlines  YMMV     By this I mean  don   t do that  because it will not work   If yourself or others forget to git checkout-symlinks before doing something with potentially wide-sweeping consequences like git add -A  the local repository could end up in a polluted state   Using our  example repo  from before   echo  I am nuthafile   gt  dir foo bar nuthafile echo  Updating file   gt  gt  file git add -A git status   On branch master   Changes to be committed       use  git reset HEAD  lt file gt      to unstage            new file    dir foo bar nuthafile         modified    file         deleted     lnk bar             POLLUTION         new file    lnk bar baz         POLLUTION         new file    lnk bar lnk file    POLLUTION         new file    lnk bar nuthafile   POLLUTION     Whoops     For this reason  it s nice to include these aliases as steps to perform for Windows users before-and-after building a project  rather than after checkout or before pushing  But each situation is different  These aliases have been useful enough for me that a true post-checkout solution hasn t been necessary     Hope that helps   References   http   git-scm com book en Git-Internals-Git-Objects  http   technet microsoft com en-us library cc753194  Last Update  2019-03-13   POSIX compliance  well  except for those mklink calls  of course      no more Bashisms  Directories and files with spaces in them are supported  Zero and non-zero exit status codes  for communicating success failure of the requested command  respectively  are now properly preserved returned  The add-symlink alias now works more like ln 1  and can be used from any directory in the repository  not just the repository   s root directory  The rm-symlink alias  singular  has been superseded by the rm-symlinks alias  plural   which now accepts multiple arguments  or no arguments at all  which finds all of the symlinks throughout the repository  as before  for selectively transforming git symlinks into NTFS hardlinks junctions  The checkout-symlinks alias has also been updated to accept multiple arguments  or none at all     everything  for selective reversal of the aforementioned transformations    Final Note  While I did test loading and running these aliases using Bash 3 2  and even 3 1  for those who may still be stuck on such ancient versions for any number of reasons  be aware that versions as old as these are notorious for their parser bugs  If you experience issues while trying to install any of these aliases  the first thing you should look into is upgrading your shell  for Bash  check the version with CTRL X  CTRL V   Alternatively  if you   re trying to install them by pasting them into your terminal emulator  you may have more luck pasting them into a file and sourcing it instead  e g  as      git-win-symlinks sh   Good luck

User · Answer

Here is a batch script for converting symlinks in repository  for files only  based on Josh Lee s answer  Script with some additional check for administrator rights is at https   gist github com Quazistax 8daf09080bf54b4c7641    echo off pushd    dp0  setlocal EnableDelayedExpansion  for  f  tokens 3      e in   git ls-files -s    findstr  R  C   120000    do        call  processFirstLine   f   REM pause goto  eof   processFirstLine  echo   echo FILE      1  dir    f1    find   lt SYMLINK gt    gt NUL  amp  amp       echo FILE already is a symlink   goto  eof    for  f  usebackq tokens      l in     f1   do      echo LINK TO    l    del    f1    if not  ERRORLEVEL     0        echo FAILED  del     goto  eof        setlocal   call  expandRelative linkto   1     l    mklink    f1    linkto     endlocal   if not  ERRORLEVEL     0        echo FAILED  mklink      echo reverting deletion        git checkout --    f1      goto  eof        git update-index --assume-unchanged   1    if not  ERRORLEVEL     0        echo FAILED  git update-index --assume-unchanged     goto  eof        echo SUCCESS   goto  eof   goto  eof     param1   result variable    param2   reference path from which relative will be resolved    param3   relative path  expandRelative   pushd     cd    dp2    set  1   f3   popd goto  eof

User · Answer

so as things have changed with GIT since alot of these answers were posted here is the correct instructions to get symlinks working correctly in windows as of   AUGUST 2018    1  Make sure git is installed with symlink support    2  Tell Bash to create hardlinks instead of symlinks  EDIT --  git folder  etc bash bashrc  ADD TO BOTTOM - MSYS winsymlinks nativestrict  3  Set git config to use symlinks  git config core symlinks true   or  git clone -c core symlinks true  lt URL gt    NOTE  I have tried adding this to the global git config and at the moment it is not working for me so I recommend adding this to each repo     4  pull the repo  NOTE  Unless you have enabled developer mode in the latest version of Windows 10  you need to run bash as administrator to create symlinks  5  Reset all Symlinks  optional  If you have an existing repo  or are using submodules you may find that the symlinks are not being created correctly so to refresh all the symlinks in the repo you can run these commands    find -type l -delete git reset --hard   NOTE  this will reset any changes since last commit so make sure you have committed first

User · Answer

It ought to be implemented in msysgit  but there are two downsides     Symbolic links are only available in Windows Vista and later  should not be an issue in 2011  and yet it is      since older versions only support directory junctions   the big one  Microsoft considers symbolic links a security risk and so only administrators can create them by default  You ll need to elevate privileges of the git process or use fstool to change this behavior on every machine you work on    I did a quick search and there is work being actively done on this  see issue 224

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2020 Answer  Enable  quot Developer mode quot  in Windows 10 -- gives mklink permissions Ensure symlinks are enabled in git  git config --global core symlinks true or check the checkbox when installing msysgit    Switching branches will force the recreation of missing symlinks  Be careful  support for Symlinks in git on Windows is relatively new  There are some bugs that still affect some git clients  Notably  symlinks with relative      paths are mangled in some programs because of a fixed regression in libgit2  GitKraken is affected by this  for instance

User · Answer

The most recent version of git scm  testet 2 11 1  allows to enable symbolic links  But you have to clone the repository with the symlinks again git clone -c core symlinks true  lt URL gt   You need to run this command with administrator rights  It is also possible to create symlinks on Windows with mklink  Check out the wiki

User · Answer

I was looking for an easy solution to deal with the unix symbolic links on windows  Thank you very much for the above Git aliases  There is one little optimization that can be done to the rm-symlinks so that it doesn t delete the files in the destination folder in case the alias is run a second time accidentally  Please observe the new if condition in the loop to make sure the file is not already a link to a directory before the logic is run   git config --global alias rm-symlinks     git rm symlinks    for symlink in   git ls-files -s   egrep   120000    cut -f2   do      if   -d   symlink     then       continue     fi      git rm-symlink   symlink      git update-index --assume-unchanged   symlink  done      git rm symlinksenter

[windows] Git Symlinks in Windows

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