337 lines
13 KiB
Text
337 lines
13 KiB
Text
Git Protocol Capabilities
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=========================
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NOTE: this document describes capabilities for versions 0 and 1 of the pack
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protocol. For version 2, please refer to the link:protocol-v2.html[protocol-v2]
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doc.
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Servers SHOULD support all capabilities defined in this document.
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On the very first line of the initial server response of either
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receive-pack and upload-pack the first reference is followed by
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a NUL byte and then a list of space delimited server capabilities.
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These allow the server to declare what it can and cannot support
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to the client.
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Client will then send a space separated list of capabilities it wants
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to be in effect. The client MUST NOT ask for capabilities the server
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did not say it supports.
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Server MUST diagnose and abort if capabilities it does not understand
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was sent. Server MUST NOT ignore capabilities that client requested
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and server advertised. As a consequence of these rules, server MUST
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NOT advertise capabilities it does not understand.
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The 'atomic', 'report-status', 'delete-refs', 'quiet', and 'push-cert'
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capabilities are sent and recognized by the receive-pack (push to server)
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process.
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The 'ofs-delta' and 'side-band-64k' capabilities are sent and recognized
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by both upload-pack and receive-pack protocols. The 'agent' capability
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may optionally be sent in both protocols.
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All other capabilities are only recognized by the upload-pack (fetch
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from server) process.
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multi_ack
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---------
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The 'multi_ack' capability allows the server to return "ACK obj-id
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continue" as soon as it finds a commit that it can use as a common
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base, between the client's wants and the client's have set.
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By sending this early, the server can potentially head off the client
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from walking any further down that particular branch of the client's
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repository history. The client may still need to walk down other
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branches, sending have lines for those, until the server has a
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complete cut across the DAG, or the client has said "done".
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Without multi_ack, a client sends have lines in --date-order until
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the server has found a common base. That means the client will send
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have lines that are already known by the server to be common, because
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they overlap in time with another branch that the server hasn't found
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a common base on yet.
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For example suppose the client has commits in caps that the server
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doesn't and the server has commits in lower case that the client
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doesn't, as in the following diagram:
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+---- u ---------------------- x
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/ +----- y
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/ /
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a -- b -- c -- d -- E -- F
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\
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+--- Q -- R -- S
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If the client wants x,y and starts out by saying have F,S, the server
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doesn't know what F,S is. Eventually the client says "have d" and
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the server sends "ACK d continue" to let the client know to stop
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walking down that line (so don't send c-b-a), but it's not done yet,
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it needs a base for x. The client keeps going with S-R-Q, until a
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gets reached, at which point the server has a clear base and it all
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ends.
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Without multi_ack the client would have sent that c-b-a chain anyway,
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interleaved with S-R-Q.
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multi_ack_detailed
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------------------
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This is an extension of multi_ack that permits client to better
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understand the server's in-memory state. See pack-protocol.txt,
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section "Packfile Negotiation" for more information.
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no-done
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-------
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This capability should only be used with the smart HTTP protocol. If
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multi_ack_detailed and no-done are both present, then the sender is
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free to immediately send a pack following its first "ACK obj-id ready"
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message.
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Without no-done in the smart HTTP protocol, the server session would
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end and the client has to make another trip to send "done" before
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the server can send the pack. no-done removes the last round and
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thus slightly reduces latency.
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thin-pack
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---------
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A thin pack is one with deltas which reference base objects not
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contained within the pack (but are known to exist at the receiving
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end). This can reduce the network traffic significantly, but it
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requires the receiving end to know how to "thicken" these packs by
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adding the missing bases to the pack.
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The upload-pack server advertises 'thin-pack' when it can generate
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and send a thin pack. A client requests the 'thin-pack' capability
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when it understands how to "thicken" it, notifying the server that
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it can receive such a pack. A client MUST NOT request the
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'thin-pack' capability if it cannot turn a thin pack into a
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self-contained pack.
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Receive-pack, on the other hand, is assumed by default to be able to
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handle thin packs, but can ask the client not to use the feature by
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advertising the 'no-thin' capability. A client MUST NOT send a thin
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pack if the server advertises the 'no-thin' capability.
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The reasons for this asymmetry are historical. The receive-pack
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program did not exist until after the invention of thin packs, so
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historically the reference implementation of receive-pack always
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understood thin packs. Adding 'no-thin' later allowed receive-pack
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to disable the feature in a backwards-compatible manner.
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side-band, side-band-64k
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------------------------
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This capability means that server can send, and client understand multiplexed
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progress reports and error info interleaved with the packfile itself.
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These two options are mutually exclusive. A modern client always
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favors 'side-band-64k'.
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Either mode indicates that the packfile data will be streamed broken
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up into packets of up to either 1000 bytes in the case of 'side_band',
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or 65520 bytes in the case of 'side_band_64k'. Each packet is made up
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of a leading 4-byte pkt-line length of how much data is in the packet,
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followed by a 1-byte stream code, followed by the actual data.
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The stream code can be one of:
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1 - pack data
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2 - progress messages
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3 - fatal error message just before stream aborts
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The "side-band-64k" capability came about as a way for newer clients
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that can handle much larger packets to request packets that are
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actually crammed nearly full, while maintaining backward compatibility
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for the older clients.
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Further, with side-band and its up to 1000-byte messages, it's actually
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999 bytes of payload and 1 byte for the stream code. With side-band-64k,
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same deal, you have up to 65519 bytes of data and 1 byte for the stream
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code.
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The client MUST send only maximum of one of "side-band" and "side-
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band-64k". Server MUST diagnose it as an error if client requests
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both.
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ofs-delta
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---------
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Server can send, and client understand PACKv2 with delta referring to
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its base by position in pack rather than by an obj-id. That is, they can
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send/read OBJ_OFS_DELTA (aka type 6) in a packfile.
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agent
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-----
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The server may optionally send a capability of the form `agent=X` to
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notify the client that the server is running version `X`. The client may
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optionally return its own agent string by responding with an `agent=Y`
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capability (but it MUST NOT do so if the server did not mention the
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agent capability). The `X` and `Y` strings may contain any printable
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ASCII characters except space (i.e., the byte range 32 < x < 127), and
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are typically of the form "package/version" (e.g., "git/1.8.3.1"). The
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agent strings are purely informative for statistics and debugging
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purposes, and MUST NOT be used to programmatically assume the presence
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or absence of particular features.
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symref
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------
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This parameterized capability is used to inform the receiver which symbolic ref
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points to which ref; for example, "symref=HEAD:refs/heads/master" tells the
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receiver that HEAD points to master. This capability can be repeated to
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represent multiple symrefs.
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Servers SHOULD include this capability for the HEAD symref if it is one of the
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refs being sent.
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Clients MAY use the parameters from this capability to select the proper initial
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branch when cloning a repository.
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shallow
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-------
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This capability adds "deepen", "shallow" and "unshallow" commands to
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the fetch-pack/upload-pack protocol so clients can request shallow
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clones.
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deepen-since
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------------
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This capability adds "deepen-since" command to fetch-pack/upload-pack
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protocol so the client can request shallow clones that are cut at a
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specific time, instead of depth. Internally it's equivalent of doing
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"rev-list --max-age=<timestamp>" on the server side. "deepen-since"
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cannot be used with "deepen".
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deepen-not
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----------
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This capability adds "deepen-not" command to fetch-pack/upload-pack
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protocol so the client can request shallow clones that are cut at a
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specific revision, instead of depth. Internally it's equivalent of
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doing "rev-list --not <rev>" on the server side. "deepen-not"
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cannot be used with "deepen", but can be used with "deepen-since".
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deepen-relative
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---------------
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If this capability is requested by the client, the semantics of
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"deepen" command is changed. The "depth" argument is the depth from
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the current shallow boundary, instead of the depth from remote refs.
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no-progress
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-----------
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The client was started with "git clone -q" or something, and doesn't
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want that side band 2. Basically the client just says "I do not
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wish to receive stream 2 on sideband, so do not send it to me, and if
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you did, I will drop it on the floor anyway". However, the sideband
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channel 3 is still used for error responses.
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include-tag
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-----------
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The 'include-tag' capability is about sending annotated tags if we are
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sending objects they point to. If we pack an object to the client, and
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a tag object points exactly at that object, we pack the tag object too.
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In general this allows a client to get all new annotated tags when it
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fetches a branch, in a single network connection.
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Clients MAY always send include-tag, hardcoding it into a request when
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the server advertises this capability. The decision for a client to
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request include-tag only has to do with the client's desires for tag
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data, whether or not a server had advertised objects in the
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refs/tags/* namespace.
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Servers MUST pack the tags if their referrant is packed and the client
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has requested include-tags.
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Clients MUST be prepared for the case where a server has ignored
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include-tag and has not actually sent tags in the pack. In such
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cases the client SHOULD issue a subsequent fetch to acquire the tags
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that include-tag would have otherwise given the client.
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The server SHOULD send include-tag, if it supports it, regardless
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of whether or not there are tags available.
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report-status
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-------------
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The receive-pack process can receive a 'report-status' capability,
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which tells it that the client wants a report of what happened after
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a packfile upload and reference update. If the pushing client requests
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this capability, after unpacking and updating references the server
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will respond with whether the packfile unpacked successfully and if
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each reference was updated successfully. If any of those were not
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successful, it will send back an error message. See pack-protocol.txt
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for example messages.
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delete-refs
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-----------
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If the server sends back the 'delete-refs' capability, it means that
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it is capable of accepting a zero-id value as the target
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value of a reference update. It is not sent back by the client, it
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simply informs the client that it can be sent zero-id values
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to delete references.
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quiet
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-----
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If the receive-pack server advertises the 'quiet' capability, it is
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capable of silencing human-readable progress output which otherwise may
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be shown when processing the received pack. A send-pack client should
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respond with the 'quiet' capability to suppress server-side progress
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reporting if the local progress reporting is also being suppressed
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(e.g., via `push -q`, or if stderr does not go to a tty).
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atomic
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------
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If the server sends the 'atomic' capability it is capable of accepting
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atomic pushes. If the pushing client requests this capability, the server
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will update the refs in one atomic transaction. Either all refs are
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updated or none.
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push-options
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------------
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If the server sends the 'push-options' capability it is able to accept
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push options after the update commands have been sent, but before the
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packfile is streamed. If the pushing client requests this capability,
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the server will pass the options to the pre- and post- receive hooks
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that process this push request.
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allow-tip-sha1-in-want
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----------------------
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If the upload-pack server advertises this capability, fetch-pack may
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send "want" lines with SHA-1s that exist at the server but are not
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advertised by upload-pack.
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allow-reachable-sha1-in-want
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----------------------------
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If the upload-pack server advertises this capability, fetch-pack may
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send "want" lines with SHA-1s that exist at the server but are not
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advertised by upload-pack.
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push-cert=<nonce>
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-----------------
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The receive-pack server that advertises this capability is willing
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to accept a signed push certificate, and asks the <nonce> to be
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included in the push certificate. A send-pack client MUST NOT
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send a push-cert packet unless the receive-pack server advertises
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this capability.
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filter
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------
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If the upload-pack server advertises the 'filter' capability,
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fetch-pack may send "filter" commands to request a partial clone
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or partial fetch and request that the server omit various objects
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from the packfile.
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