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largefiles: improve help...
Greg Ward -
r15230:697289c5 default
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@@ -8,22 +8,76 b''
8 8
9 9 '''track large binary files
10 10
11 Large binary files tend to be not very compressible, not very "diffable", and
12 not at all mergeable. Such files are not handled well by Mercurial\'s storage
13 format (revlog), which is based on compressed binary deltas. largefiles solves
14 this problem by adding a centralized client-server layer on top of Mercurial:
15 largefiles live in a *central store* out on the network somewhere, and you only
16 fetch the ones that you need when you need them.
11 Large binary files tend to be not very compressible, not very
12 diffable, and not at all mergeable. Such files are not handled
13 efficiently by Mercurial's storage format (revlog), which is based on
14 compressed binary deltas; storing large binary files as regular
15 Mercurial files wastes bandwidth and disk space and increases
16 Mercurial's memory usage. The largefiles extension addresses these
17 problems by adding a centralized client-server layer on top of
18 Mercurial: largefiles live in a *central store* out on the network
19 somewhere, and you only fetch the revisions that you need when you
20 need them.
21
22 largefiles works by maintaining a "standin file" in .hglf/ for each
23 largefile. The standins are small (41 bytes: an SHA-1 hash plus
24 newline) and are tracked by Mercurial. Largefile revisions are
25 identified by the SHA-1 hash of their contents, which is written to
26 the standin. largefiles uses that revision ID to get/put largefile
27 revisions from/to the central store. This saves both disk space and
28 bandwidth, since you don't need to retrieve all historical revisions
29 of large files when you clone or pull.
30
31 To start a new repository or add new large binary files, just add
32 --large to your ``hg add`` command. For example::
33
34 $ dd if=/dev/urandom of=randomdata count=2000
35 $ hg add --large randomdata
36 $ hg commit -m 'add randomdata as a largefile'
37
38 When you push a changeset that adds/modifies largefiles to a remote
39 repository, its largefile revisions will be uploaded along with it.
40 Note that the remote Mercurial must also have the largefiles extension
41 enabled for this to work.
17 42
18 largefiles works by maintaining a *standin* in .hglf/ for each largefile. The
19 standins are small (41 bytes: an SHA-1 hash plus newline) and are tracked by
20 Mercurial. Largefile revisions are identified by the SHA-1 hash of their
21 contents, which is written to the standin. largefiles uses that revision ID to
22 get/put largefile revisions from/to the central store.
43 When you pull a changeset that affects largefiles from a remote
44 repository, Mercurial behaves as normal. However, when you update to
45 such a revision, any largefiles needed by that revision are downloaded
46 and cached (if they have never been downloaded before). This means
47 that network access may be required to update to changesets you have
48 not previously updated to.
49
50 If you already have large files tracked by Mercurial without the
51 largefiles extension, you will need to convert your repository in
52 order to benefit from largefiles. This is done with the 'hg lfconvert'
53 command::
54
55 $ hg lfconvert --size 10 oldrepo newrepo
23 56
24 A complete tutorial for using lfiles is included in ``usage.txt`` in the lfiles
25 source distribution. See
26 https://developers.kilnhg.com/Repo/Kiln/largefiles/largefiles/File/usage.txt
57 In repositories that already have largefiles in them, any new file
58 over 10MB will automatically be added as a largefile. To change this
59 threshhold, set ``largefiles.size`` in your Mercurial config file to
60 the minimum size in megabytes to track as a largefile, or use the
61 --lfsize option to the add command (also in megabytes)::
62
63 [largefiles]
64 size = 2 XXX wouldn't minsize be a better name?
65
66 $ hg add --lfsize 2
67
68 The ``largefiles.patterns`` config option allows you to specify a list
69 of filename patterns (see ``hg help patterns``) that should always be
70 tracked as largefiles::
71
72 [largefiles]
73 patterns =
74 *.jpg
75 re:.*\.(png|bmp)$
76 library.zip
77 content/audio/*
78
79 Files that match one of these patterns will be added as largefiles
80 regardless of their size.
27 81 '''
28 82
29 83 from mercurial import commands
@@ -20,14 +20,23 b' import basestore'
20 20 # -- Commands ----------------------------------------------------------
21 21
22 22 def lfconvert(ui, src, dest, *pats, **opts):
23 '''Convert a normal repository to a largefiles repository
23 '''convert a normal repository to a largefiles repository
24 24
25 Convert source repository creating an identical repository, except that all
26 files that match the patterns given, or are over the given size will be
27 added as largefiles. The size used to determine whether or not to track a
28 file as a largefile is the size of the first version of the file. After
29 running this command you will need to make sure that largefiles is enabled
30 anywhere you intend to push the new repository.'''
25 Convert repository SOURCE to a new repository DEST, identical to
26 SOURCE except that certain files will be converted as largefiles:
27 specifically, any file that matches any PATTERN *or* whose size is
28 above the minimum size threshold is converted as a largefile. The
29 size used to determine whether or not to track a file as a
30 largefile is the size of the first version of the file. The
31 minimum size can be specified either with --size or in
32 configuration as ``largefiles.size``.
33
34 After running this command you will need to make sure that
35 largefiles is enabled anywhere you intend to push the new
36 repository.
37
38 Use --tonormal to convert largefiles back to normal files; after
39 this, the DEST repository can be used without largefiles at all.'''
31 40
32 41 if opts['tonormal']:
33 42 tolfile = False
@@ -464,10 +473,12 b' def _updatelfile(repo, lfdirstate, lfile'
464 473
465 474 cmdtable = {
466 475 'lfconvert': (lfconvert,
467 [('s', 'size', '', 'All files over this size (in megabytes) '
468 'will be considered largefiles. This can also be specified '
469 'in your hgrc as [largefiles].size.'),
476 [('s', 'size', '',
477 _('minimum size (MB) for files to be converted '
478 'as largefiles'),
479 'SIZE'),
470 480 ('','tonormal',False,
471 'Convert from a largefiles repo to a normal repo')],
481 _('convert from a largefiles repo to a normal repo')),
482 ],
472 483 _('hg lfconvert SOURCE DEST [FILE ...]')),
473 484 }
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