How can I get Git to follow symlinks

Question

Is my best be going to be a shell script which replaces symlinks with copies  or is there another way of telling Git to follow symlinks   PS  I know it s not very secure  but I only want to do it in a few specific cases

User · Answer

Hmmm  mount --bind doesn t seem to work on Darwin   Does anyone have a trick that does    edited   OK  I found the answer on Mac nbsp OS nbsp X is to make a hardlink  Except that that API is not exposed via ln  so you have to use your own tiny program to do this  Here is a link to that program   Creating directory hard links in Mac OS X  Enjoy

User · Answer

With Git 2 3 2   Q1 2015   there is one other case where Git will not follow symlink anymore  see commit e0d201b by Junio C Hamano  gitster   main Git maintainer   apply  do not touch a file beyond a symbolic link     Because Git tracks symbolic links as symbolic links  a path that has a symbolic link in its leading part  e g  path to dir file  where path to dir is a symbolic link to somewhere else  be it inside or outside the working tree  can never appear in a patch that validly applies  unless the same patch first removes the symbolic link to allow a directory to be created there       Detect and reject such a patch       Similarly  when an input creates a symbolic link path to dir and then creates a file path to dir file  we need to flag it as an error without actually creating path to dir symbolic link in the filesystem       Instead  for any patch in the input that leaves a path  i e  a non deletion  in the result  we check all leading paths against the resulting tree that the patch would create by inspecting all the patches in the input and then the target of patch application  either the index or the working tree        This way  we          catch a mischief or a mistake to add a symbolic link path to dir and a file path to dir file at the same time     while allowing a valid patch that removes a symbolic link path to dir and then adds a file path to dir file       That means  in that case  the error message won t be a generic one like   s  patch does not apply   but a more specific one   affected file   s  is beyond a symbolic link

User · Answer

Use hard links instead  This differs from a soft  symbolic  link  All programs  including git will treat the file as a regular file  Note that the contents can be modified by changing either the source or the destination  On macOS  before 10 13 High Sierra  If you already have git and Xcode installed  install hardlink  It s a microscopic tool to create hard links  To create the hard link  simply  hln source destination  macOS High Sierra update  Does Apple File System support directory hard links  Directory hard links are not supported by Apple File System  All directory hard links are converted to symbolic links or aliases when you convert from HFS  to APFS volume formats on macOS  From APFS FAQ on developer apple com  Follow https   github com selkhateeb hardlink issues 31 for future alternatives  On Linux and other Unix flavors The ln command can make hard links  ln source destination  On Windows  Vista  7  8       Use mklink to create a junction on Windows  mklink  j  quot source quot   quot destination quot

User · Answer

NOTE  This advice is now out-dated as per comment since Git 1 6 1  Git used to behave this way  and no longer does     Git by default attempts to store symlinks instead of following them  for compactness  and it s generally what people want    However  I accidentally managed to get it to add files beyond the symlink when the symlink is a directory   I e       foo     foo baz    bar foo -- gt   foo    bar foo baz   by doing   git add  bar foo baz   it appeared to work when I tried it  That behavior was however unwanted by me at the time  so I can t give you information beyond that

User · Answer

I m using Git 1 5 4 3 and it s following the passed symlink if it has a trailing slash  E g     Adds the symlink itself   git add symlink    Follows symlink and adds the denoted directory s contents   git add symlink

User · Answer

I got tired of every solution in here either being outdated or requiring root  so I made an LD PRELOAD-based solution  Linux only    It hooks into Git s internals  overriding the  is this a symlink   function  allowing symlinks to be treated as their contents  By default  all links to outside the repo are inlined  see the link for details

User · Answer

What I did to add to get the files within a symlink into Git  I didn t use a symlink but    sudo mount --bind SOURCEDIRECTORY TARGETDIRECTORY   Do this command in the Git-managed directory  TARGETDIRECTORY has to be created before the SOURCEDIRECTORY is mounted into it   It works fine on Linux  but not on OS nbsp X  That trick helped me with Subversion too  I use it to include files from an Dropbox account  where a webdesigner does his her stuff

User · Answer

I used to add files beyond symlinks for quite some time now  This used to work just fine  without making any special arrangements  Since I updated to Git 1 6 1  this does not work any more   You may be able to switch to Git 1 6 0 to make this work  I hope that a future version of Git will have a flag to git-add allowing it to follow symlinks again

User · Answer

Conversion from symlinks could be useful  Link in a Git folder instead of a symlink by a script

User · Answer

On MacOS  I have Mojave  10 14  git version 2 7 1   use bindfs    brew install bindfs  cd  path to git controlled dir    mkdir local copy dir  bindfs  lt  full path to source dir gt   lt  full path to local copy dir gt   It s been hinted by other comments  but not clearly provided in other answers  Hopefully this saves someone some time

User · Answer

On MacOS  I have Mojave  10 14  git version 2 7 1   use bindfs    brew install bindfs  cd  path to git controlled dir    mkdir local copy dir  bindfs  lt  full path to source dir gt   lt  full path to local copy dir gt   It s been hinted by other comments  but not clearly provided in other answers  Hopefully this saves someone some time

User · Answer

Conversion from symlinks could be useful  Link in a Git folder instead of a symlink by a script

User · Answer

With Git 2 3 2   Q1 2015   there is one other case where Git will not follow symlink anymore  see commit e0d201b by Junio C Hamano  gitster   main Git maintainer   apply  do not touch a file beyond a symbolic link     Because Git tracks symbolic links as symbolic links  a path that has a symbolic link in its leading part  e g  path to dir file  where path to dir is a symbolic link to somewhere else  be it inside or outside the working tree  can never appear in a patch that validly applies  unless the same patch first removes the symbolic link to allow a directory to be created there       Detect and reject such a patch       Similarly  when an input creates a symbolic link path to dir and then creates a file path to dir file  we need to flag it as an error without actually creating path to dir symbolic link in the filesystem       Instead  for any patch in the input that leaves a path  i e  a non deletion  in the result  we check all leading paths against the resulting tree that the patch would create by inspecting all the patches in the input and then the target of patch application  either the index or the working tree        This way  we          catch a mischief or a mistake to add a symbolic link path to dir and a file path to dir file at the same time     while allowing a valid patch that removes a symbolic link path to dir and then adds a file path to dir file       That means  in that case  the error message won t be a generic one like   s  patch does not apply   but a more specific one   affected file   s  is beyond a symbolic link

User · Answer

I used to add files beyond symlinks for quite some time now  This used to work just fine  without making any special arrangements  Since I updated to Git 1 6 1  this does not work any more   You may be able to switch to Git 1 6 0 to make this work  I hope that a future version of Git will have a flag to git-add allowing it to follow symlinks again

User · Answer

An alternative implementation of what  user252400 proposes is to use bwrap  a small setuid sandbox that can be found in all major distributions - often installed by default  bwrap allows you to bind mount directories without sudo and automatically unbinds them when git or your shell exits  Assuming your development process isn t too crazy  see bellow   start bash in a private namespace and bind the external directory under the git directory  bwrap --ro-bind             --bind  EXTERNAL-DIR   MOUNTPOINT-IN-GIT-DIR          --dev  dev         bash  Then do everything you d do normally like git add  git commit  and so on  When you re done  just exit bash  Clean and simple  Caveats  To prevent sandbox escapes  bwrap is not allowed to execute other setuid binaries  See man bwrap for more details

User · Answer

I m using Git 1 5 4 3 and it s following the passed symlink if it has a trailing slash  E g     Adds the symlink itself   git add symlink    Follows symlink and adds the denoted directory s contents   git add symlink

User · Answer

This is a pre-commit hook which replaces the symlink blobs in the index  with the content of those symlinks   Put this in  git hooks pre-commit  and make it executable      bin sh    replace  find    with  find    lt path gt   below  to work with only specific paths      these lines are really all one line  on multiple lines for clarity       find symlinks which do not dereference to directories    find   -type l -exec test     -d        -print -exec sh -c        remove the symlink blob  and add the content diff  to the index cache      git rm --cached   1   diff -au  dev null   1    git apply --cached -p1 -         and call out to  sh        process links to nondir            the end   Notes  We use POSIX compliant functionality as much as possible  however  diff -a is not POSIX compliant  possibly among other things   There may be some mistakes errors in this code  even though it was tested somewhat

User · Answer

NOTE  This advice is now out-dated as per comment since Git 1 6 1  Git used to behave this way  and no longer does     Git by default attempts to store symlinks instead of following them  for compactness  and it s generally what people want    However  I accidentally managed to get it to add files beyond the symlink when the symlink is a directory   I e       foo     foo baz    bar foo -- gt   foo    bar foo baz   by doing   git add  bar foo baz   it appeared to work when I tried it  That behavior was however unwanted by me at the time  so I can t give you information beyond that

User · Answer

What I did to add to get the files within a symlink into Git  I didn t use a symlink but    sudo mount --bind SOURCEDIRECTORY TARGETDIRECTORY   Do this command in the Git-managed directory  TARGETDIRECTORY has to be created before the SOURCEDIRECTORY is mounted into it   It works fine on Linux  but not on OS nbsp X  That trick helped me with Subversion too  I use it to include files from an Dropbox account  where a webdesigner does his her stuff

User · Answer

NOTE  This advice is now out-dated as per comment since Git 1 6 1  Git used to behave this way  and no longer does     Git by default attempts to store symlinks instead of following them  for compactness  and it s generally what people want    However  I accidentally managed to get it to add files beyond the symlink when the symlink is a directory   I e       foo     foo baz    bar foo -- gt   foo    bar foo baz   by doing   git add  bar foo baz   it appeared to work when I tried it  That behavior was however unwanted by me at the time  so I can t give you information beyond that

User · Answer

I got tired of every solution in here either being outdated or requiring root  so I made an LD PRELOAD-based solution  Linux only    It hooks into Git s internals  overriding the  is this a symlink   function  allowing symlinks to be treated as their contents  By default  all links to outside the repo are inlined  see the link for details

User · Answer

I used to add files beyond symlinks for quite some time now  This used to work just fine  without making any special arrangements  Since I updated to Git 1 6 1  this does not work any more   You may be able to switch to Git 1 6 0 to make this work  I hope that a future version of Git will have a flag to git-add allowing it to follow symlinks again

User · Answer

I used to add files beyond symlinks for quite some time now  This used to work just fine  without making any special arrangements  Since I updated to Git 1 6 1  this does not work any more   You may be able to switch to Git 1 6 0 to make this work  I hope that a future version of Git will have a flag to git-add allowing it to follow symlinks again

User · Answer

An alternative implementation of what  user252400 proposes is to use bwrap  a small setuid sandbox that can be found in all major distributions - often installed by default  bwrap allows you to bind mount directories without sudo and automatically unbinds them when git or your shell exits  Assuming your development process isn t too crazy  see bellow   start bash in a private namespace and bind the external directory under the git directory  bwrap --ro-bind             --bind  EXTERNAL-DIR   MOUNTPOINT-IN-GIT-DIR          --dev  dev         bash  Then do everything you d do normally like git add  git commit  and so on  When you re done  just exit bash  Clean and simple  Caveats  To prevent sandbox escapes  bwrap is not allowed to execute other setuid binaries  See man bwrap for more details

User · Answer

Hmmm  mount --bind doesn t seem to work on Darwin   Does anyone have a trick that does    edited   OK  I found the answer on Mac nbsp OS nbsp X is to make a hardlink  Except that that API is not exposed via ln  so you have to use your own tiny program to do this  Here is a link to that program   Creating directory hard links in Mac OS X  Enjoy

User · Answer

Use hard links instead  This differs from a soft  symbolic  link  All programs  including git will treat the file as a regular file  Note that the contents can be modified by changing either the source or the destination  On macOS  before 10 13 High Sierra  If you already have git and Xcode installed  install hardlink  It s a microscopic tool to create hard links  To create the hard link  simply  hln source destination  macOS High Sierra update  Does Apple File System support directory hard links  Directory hard links are not supported by Apple File System  All directory hard links are converted to symbolic links or aliases when you convert from HFS  to APFS volume formats on macOS  From APFS FAQ on developer apple com  Follow https   github com selkhateeb hardlink issues 31 for future alternatives  On Linux and other Unix flavors The ln command can make hard links  ln source destination  On Windows  Vista  7  8       Use mklink to create a junction on Windows  mklink  j  quot source quot   quot destination quot

User · Answer

Why not create symlinks the other way around  Meaning instead of linking from the Git repository to the application directory  just link the other way around   For example  let   s say I am setting up an application installed in   application that needs a configuration file config conf    I add config conf to my Git repository  for example  at   repos application config conf  Then I create a symlink from   application by running  ln -s   repos application config conf    This approach might not always work  but it worked well for me so far

User · Answer

NOTE  This advice is now out-dated as per comment since Git 1 6 1  Git used to behave this way  and no longer does     Git by default attempts to store symlinks instead of following them  for compactness  and it s generally what people want    However  I accidentally managed to get it to add files beyond the symlink when the symlink is a directory   I e       foo     foo baz    bar foo -- gt   foo    bar foo baz   by doing   git add  bar foo baz   it appeared to work when I tried it  That behavior was however unwanted by me at the time  so I can t give you information beyond that

User · Answer

This is a pre-commit hook which replaces the symlink blobs in the index  with the content of those symlinks   Put this in  git hooks pre-commit  and make it executable      bin sh    replace  find    with  find    lt path gt   below  to work with only specific paths      these lines are really all one line  on multiple lines for clarity       find symlinks which do not dereference to directories    find   -type l -exec test     -d        -print -exec sh -c        remove the symlink blob  and add the content diff  to the index cache      git rm --cached   1   diff -au  dev null   1    git apply --cached -p1 -         and call out to  sh        process links to nondir            the end   Notes  We use POSIX compliant functionality as much as possible  however  diff -a is not POSIX compliant  possibly among other things   There may be some mistakes errors in this code  even though it was tested somewhat

User · Answer

Why not create symlinks the other way around  Meaning instead of linking from the Git repository to the application directory  just link the other way around   For example  let   s say I am setting up an application installed in   application that needs a configuration file config conf    I add config conf to my Git repository  for example  at   repos application config conf  Then I create a symlink from   application by running  ln -s   repos application config conf    This approach might not always work  but it worked well for me so far

[git] How can I get Git to follow symlinks?

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