OPTIONS¶
base-name
Write into a pair of files (.pack and .idx), using
<base-name> to determine the name of the created file. When this option
is used, the two files are written in
<base-name>-<SHA-1>.{pack,idx} files. <SHA-1> is a hash of
the sorted object names to make the resulting filename based on the pack
content, and written to the standard output of the command.
--stdout
Write the pack contents (what would have been written to
.pack file) out to the standard output.
--revs
Read the revision arguments from the standard input,
instead of individual object names. The revision arguments are processed the
same way as git rev-list with the --objects flag uses its commit
arguments to build the list of objects it outputs. The objects on the
resulting list are packed.
--unpacked
This implies --revs. When processing the list of revision
arguments read from the standard input, limit the objects packed to those that
are not already packed.
--all
This implies --revs. In addition to the list of revision
arguments read from the standard input, pretend as if all refs under refs/ are
specified to be included.
--include-tag
Include unasked-for annotated tags if the object they
reference was included in the resulting packfile. This can be useful to send
new tags to native Git clients.
--window=<n>, --depth=<n>
These two options affect how the objects contained in the
pack are stored using delta compression. The objects are first internally
sorted by type, size and optionally names and compared against the other
objects within --window to see if using delta compression saves space. --depth
limits the maximum delta depth; making it too deep affects the performance on
the unpacker side, because delta data needs to be applied that many times to
get to the necessary object. The default value for --window is 10 and --depth
is 50.
--window-memory=<n>
This option provides an additional limit on top of
--window; the window size will dynamically scale down so as to not take up
more than <n> bytes in memory. This is useful in repositories
with a mix of large and small objects to not run out of memory with a large
window, but still be able to take advantage of the large window for the
smaller objects. The size can be suffixed with "k", "m",
or "g". --window-memory=0 makes memory usage unlimited, which is the
default.
--max-pack-size=<n>
Maximum size of each output pack file. The size can be
suffixed with "k", "m", or "g". The minimum size
allowed is limited to 1 MiB. If specified, multiple packfiles may be created.
The default is unlimited, unless the config variable pack.packSizeLimit is
set.
--honor-pack-keep
This flag causes an object already in a local pack that
has a .keep file to be ignored, even if it would have otherwise been
packed.
--incremental
This flag causes an object already in a pack to be
ignored even if it would have otherwise been packed.
--local
This flag causes an object that is borrowed from an
alternate object store to be ignored even if it would have otherwise been
packed.
--non-empty
Only create a packed archive if it would contain at least
one object.
--progress
Progress status is reported on the standard error stream
by default when it is attached to a terminal, unless -q is specified. This
flag forces progress status even if the standard error stream is not directed
to a terminal.
--all-progress
When --stdout is specified then progress report is
displayed during the object count and compression phases but inhibited during
the write-out phase. The reason is that in some cases the output stream is
directly linked to another command which may wish to display progress status
of its own as it processes incoming pack data. This flag is like --progress
except that it forces progress report for the write-out phase as well even if
--stdout is used.
--all-progress-implied
This is used to imply --all-progress whenever progress
display is activated. Unlike --all-progress this flag doesn’t actually
force any progress display by itself.
-q
This flag makes the command not to report its progress on
the standard error stream.
--no-reuse-delta
When creating a packed archive in a repository that has
existing packs, the command reuses existing deltas. This sometimes results in
a slightly suboptimal pack. This flag tells the command not to reuse existing
deltas but compute them from scratch.
--no-reuse-object
This flag tells the command not to reuse existing object
data at all, including non deltified object, forcing recompression of
everything. This implies --no-reuse-delta. Useful only in the obscure case
where wholesale enforcement of a different compression level on the packed
data is desired.
--compression=<n>
Specifies compression level for newly-compressed data in
the generated pack. If not specified, pack compression level is determined
first by pack.compression, then by core.compression, and defaults to -1, the
zlib default, if neither is set. Add --no-reuse-object if you want to force a
uniform compression level on all data no matter the source.
--thin
Create a "thin" pack by omitting the common
objects between a sender and a receiver in order to reduce network transfer.
This option only makes sense in conjunction with --stdout.
Note: A thin pack violates the packed archive format by omitting
required objects and is thus unusable by Git without making it
self-contained. Use git index-pack --fix-thin (see git-index-pack(1))
to restore the self-contained property.
--delta-base-offset
A packed archive can express the base object of a delta
as either a 20-byte object name or as an offset in the stream, but ancient
versions of Git don’t understand the latter. By default,
git
pack-objects only uses the former format for better compatibility. This
option allows the command to use the latter format for compactness. Depending
on the average delta chain length, this option typically shrinks the resulting
packfile by 3-5 per-cent.
Note: Porcelain commands such as git gc (see git-gc(1)),
git repack (see git-repack(1)) pass this option by default in modern
Git when they put objects in your repository into pack files. So does git
bundle (see git-bundle(1)) when it creates a bundle.
--threads=<n>
Specifies the number of threads to spawn when searching
for best delta matches. This requires that pack-objects be compiled with
pthreads otherwise this option is ignored with a warning. This is meant to
reduce packing time on multiprocessor machines. The required amount of memory
for the delta search window is however multiplied by the number of threads.
Specifying 0 will cause Git to auto-detect the number of CPU’s and set
the number of threads accordingly.
--index-version=<version>[,<offset>]
This is intended to be used by the test suite only. It
allows to force the version for the generated pack index, and to force 64-bit
index entries on objects located above the given offset.
--keep-true-parents
With this option, parents that are hidden by grafts are
packed nevertheless.