On Thu, Feb 02, 2023 at 12:15:36PM +0100, Linux kernel regression tracking (Thorsten Leemhuis) wrote: > Then I tried creating a shallow clone like this: > > git clone > https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git > --depth 1 -b v6.1 > git remote set-branches --add origin master > git fetch --all --shallow-exclude=v6.1 > git remote add -t linux-6.1.y linux-stable > https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git > git fetch --all --shallow-exclude=v6.1 > > This took only roundabout 2 minutes and downloads & stores ~512 MByte > data (without checkout). Can we also include the option of just downloading the tarball, if it's a released version? That's the fastest and most lightweight option 100% of the time. :) > Not totally sure, but the shallow clone somehow feels more appropriate > for the use case (reminder, there is a "quickly" in the document title), > even if such a clone is less flexible (e.g. users have to manually add > stable branches they are interested it; and they need to be careful when > using git fetch). > > That's why I now strongly consider using the shallow clone method by > default in v2 of this text. Or does that also create a lot of load on > the servers? Or are there other strong reason why using a shallow clone > might be a bad idea for this use case? As I mentioned elsewhere, this is only a problem when it's done in batch mode by CI systems. A full clone uses pregenerated pack files and is very cheap, because it's effectively a sendfile operation. A shallow clone requires generating a brand new pack, compressing it, and then keeping it around in memory for the duration of the clone process. Not a big deal when a few humans here and there do it, but when 50 CI nodes do it all at once, it effectively becomes a DDoS. :) -K
