How to backup a local Git repository

Question

I am using git on a relatively small project and I find that zipping the  git directory s contents might be a fine way to back up the project  But this is kind of weird because  when I restore  the first thing I need to do is git reset --hard   Are there any problems with backing up a git repo this way  Also  is there any better way to do it  e g   a portable git format or something similar

User · Answer

The way I do this is to create a remote (bare) repository (on a separate drive, USB Key, backup server or even github) and then use push --mirror to make that remote repo look exactly like my local one (except the remote is a bare repository).

This will push all refs (branches and tags) including non-fast-forward updates. I use this for creating backups of my local repository.

The man page describes it like this:

Instead of naming each ref to push, specifies that all refs under $GIT_DIR/refs/ (which includes but is not limited to refs/heads/, refs/remotes/, and refs/tags/) be mirrored to the remote repository. Newly created local refs will be pushed to the remote end, locally updated refs will be force updated on the remote end, and deleted refs will be removed from the remote end. This is the default if the configuration option remote.<remote>.mirror is set.

I made an alias to do the push:

git config --add alias.bak "push --mirror github"

Then, I just run git bak whenever I want to do a backup.

User · Answer

Both answers to this questions are correct  but I was still missing a complete  short solution to backup a Github repository into a local file  The gist is available here  feel free to fork or adapt to your needs    backup sh      bin bash   Backup the repositories indicated in the command line   Example    bin backup user1 repo1 user1 repo2 set -e for i in     do   FILENAME   echo  i   sed  s    - g     echo     Backing up  i to  FILENAME bak    git clone git github com  i  FILENAME git --mirror   cd   FILENAME git    git bundle create     FILENAME bak --all   cd      rm -rf  i git   echo     Repository saved as  FILENAME bak  done   restore sh      bin bash   Restore the repository indicated in the command line   Example    bin restore filename bak set -e  FOLDER NAME   echo  1   sed  s  bak     git clone --bare  1  FOLDER NAME git

User · Answer

I started hacking away a bit on Yar s script and the result is on github  including man pages and install script   https   github com najamelan git-backup  Installation   git clone  https   github com najamelan git-backup git  cd git-backup sudo   install sh   Welcoming all suggestions and pull request on github      usr bin env ruby     For documentation please sea man git-backup 1      TODO    - make it a class rather than a function   - check the standard format of git warnings to be conform   - do better checking for git repo than calling git status   - if multiple entries found in config file  specify which file   - make it work with submodules   - propose to make backup directory if it does not exists   - depth feature in git config  eg  only keep 3 backups for a repo - like rotate       - TESTING      allow calling from other scripts def git backup     constants  git dir name        git             just to avoid magic  strings  filename suffix     git bundle      will be added to the filename of the created backup     Test if we are inside a git repo  git status 2 gt  amp 1   if    exitstatus    0     puts  fatal  Not a git repository   git or at least cannot get zero exit status from  git status      exit 2   else   git status success     until        File  directory   Dir pwd         git dir name                             or  File  directory   Dir pwd                                          Dir chdir            end      unless File  directory   Dir pwd      git           raise   fatal  Directory still not a git repo      Dir pwd       end  end     git-config --get of version 1 7 10 does      if the key does not exist git config exits with 1   if the key exists twice in the same file   with 2   if the key exists exactly once             with 0     if the key does not exist         an empty string is send to stdin   if the key exists multiple times  the last value  is send to stdin   if exaclty one key is found once  it s value      is send to stdin       get the setting for the backup directory   ----------------------------------------  directory    git config --get backup directory      git config adds a newline  so remove it directory chomp      check exit status of git config case    exitstatus     when 1   directory   Dir pwd                  1               puts  Warning  Could not find backup directory in your git config file  Please set it  See  man git config  for more details on git configuration files  Defaulting to the same directroy your git repo is in      directory     when 2   puts  Warning  Multiple entries of backup directory found in your git config file  Will use the last one      directory     else     unless    exitstatus    0 then raise   fatal  unknown exit status from git-config         exitstatus   end  end     verify directory exists unless File  directory   directory       raise   fatal  backup directory does not exists      directory    end     The date and time prefix   ------------------------  prefix                prefix date        Time now strftime    F              -      F   YYYY-MM-DD prefix time        Time now strftime    H  M  S        -   add date default   true add time default   false  prefix    prefix date if git config bool   backup prefix-date   add date default   prefix    prefix time if git config bool   backup prefix-time   add time default        default bundle name is the name of the repo bundle name   Dir pwd split      last    set the name of the file to the first command line argument if given bundle name   ARGV 0  if  ARGV 0      bundle name   File  join  directory  prefix   bundle name   filename suffix     puts  Backing up to bundle   bundle name inspect       git bundle will print it s own error messages if it fails  git bundle create   bundle name inspect  --all --remotes    end   def git backup      helper function to call git config to retrieve a boolean setting def git config bool  option  default value         get the setting for the prefix-time from git config    config value    git config --get   option inspect         check exit status of git config    case    exitstatus          when not set take default       when 1   return default value        when 0   return true unless config value      false no 0  i        when 2   puts  Warning  Multiple entries of   option inspect  found in your git config file  Will use the last one      config value                return true unless config value      false no 0  i        else     raise   fatal  unknown exit status from git-config         exitstatus       end end    function needs to be called if we are not included in another script git backup if   FILE       0

User · Answer

came to this question via google   Here is what i did in the simplest way   git checkout branch to clone   then create a new git branch from this branch  git checkout -b new cloned branch Switched to branch  new cloned branch    come back to original branch and continue   git checkout branch to clone   Assuming you screwed up and need to restore something from backup branch    git checkout new cloned branch --  lt filepath gt    notice the space before and after  --    Best part if anything is screwed up  you can just delete the source branch and move back to backup branch

User · Answer

Just leaving this here for my own reference    My bundle script called git-backup looks like this     usr bin env ruby if   FILE       0         bundle name   ARGV 0  if  ARGV 0           bundle name    pwd  split      last chomp if bundle name nil           bundle name      git bundle          puts  Backing up to bundle   bundle name            git bundle create  data Dropbox backup git-repos   bundle name  --all  end   Sometimes I use git backup and sometimes I use git backup different-name which gives me most of the possibilities I need

User · Answer

You can backup the git repo with git-copy   git-copy saved new project as a bare repo  it means minimum storage cost   git copy  path to project  backup project backup   Then you can restore your project with git clone  git clone  backup project backup project

User · Answer

The other offical way would be using git bundle  That will create a file that support git fetch and git pull in order to update your second repo  Useful for incremental backup and restore     But if you need to backup everything  because you do not have a second repo with some older content already in place   the backup is a bit more elaborate to do  as mentioned in my other answer  after Kent Fredric s comment     git bundle create  tmp foo master   git bundle create  tmp foo-all --all   git bundle list-heads  tmp foo   git bundle list-heads  tmp foo-all    It is an atomic operation  as opposed to making an archive from the  git folder  as commented by fantabolous     Warning  I wouldn t recommend Pat Notz s solution  which is cloning the repo  Backup many files is always more tricky than backing up or updating    just one   If you look at the history of edits of the OP Yar answer  you would see that Yar used at first a clone --mirror      with the edit      Using this with Dropbox is a total mess    You will have sync errors  and you CANNOT ROLL A DIRECTORY BACK IN DROPBOX    Use git bundle if you want to back up to your dropbox    Yar s current solution uses git bundle   I rest my case

User · Answer

Found the simple official way after wading through the walls of text above that would make you think there is none   Create a complete bundle with     git bundle create  lt filename gt  --all   Restore it with     git clone  lt filename gt   lt folder gt    This operation is atomic AFAIK  Check official docs for the gritty details   Regarding  zip   git bundles are compressed and surprisingly small compared to the  git folder size

[git] How to backup a local Git repository?

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