GIT-SPARSE-CHECKOU(1) Git Manual GIT-SPARSE-CHECKOU(1)
NAME
git-sparse-checkout - Initialize and modify the sparse-checkout
configuration, which reduces the checkout to a set of paths given by a
list of patterns.
SYNOPSIS
git sparse-checkout <subcommand> [options]
DESCRIPTION
Initialize and modify the sparse-checkout configuration, which reduces
the checkout to a set of paths given by a list of patterns.
THIS COMMAND IS EXPERIMENTAL. ITS BEHAVIOR, AND THE BEHAVIOR OF OTHER
COMMANDS IN THE PRESENCE OF SPARSE-CHECKOUTS, WILL LIKELY CHANGE IN THE
FUTURE.
COMMANDS
list
Describe the patterns in the sparse-checkout file.
init
Enable the core.sparseCheckout setting. If the sparse-checkout file
does not exist, then populate it with patterns that match every
file in the root directory and no other directories, then will
remove all directories tracked by Git. Add patterns to the
sparse-checkout file to repopulate the working directory.
To avoid interfering with other worktrees, it first enables the
extensions.worktreeConfig setting and makes sure to set the
core.sparseCheckout setting in the worktree-specific config file.
When --cone is provided, the core.sparseCheckoutCone setting is
also set, allowing for better performance with a limited set of
patterns (see CONE PATTERN SET below).
Use the --[no-]sparse-index option to toggle the use of the sparse
index format. This reduces the size of the index to be more closely
aligned with your sparse-checkout definition. This can have
significant performance advantages for commands such as git status
or git add. This feature is still experimental. Some commands might
be slower with a sparse index until they are properly integrated
with the feature.
WARNING: Using a sparse index requires modifying the index in a way
that is not completely understood by external tools. If you have
trouble with this compatibility, then run git sparse-checkout init
--no-sparse-index to rewrite your index to not be sparse. Older
versions of Git will not understand the sparse directory entries
index extension and may fail to interact with your repository until
it is disabled.
set
Write a set of patterns to the sparse-checkout file, as given as a
list of arguments following the set subcommand. Update the working
directory to match the new patterns. Enable the core.sparseCheckout
config setting if it is not already enabled.
When the --stdin option is provided, the patterns are read from
standard in as a newline-delimited list instead of from the
arguments.
When core.sparseCheckoutCone is enabled, the input list is
considered a list of directories instead of sparse-checkout
patterns. The command writes patterns to the sparse-checkout file
to include all files contained in those directories (recursively)
as well as files that are siblings of ancestor directories. The
input format matches the output of git ls-tree --name-only. This
includes interpreting pathnames that begin with a double quote (")
as C-style quoted strings.
add
Update the sparse-checkout file to include additional patterns. By
default, these patterns are read from the command-line arguments,
but they can be read from stdin using the --stdin option. When
core.sparseCheckoutCone is enabled, the given patterns are
interpreted as directory names as in the set subcommand.
reapply
Reapply the sparsity pattern rules to paths in the working tree.
Commands like merge or rebase can materialize paths to do their
work (e.g. in order to show you a conflict), and other
sparse-checkout commands might fail to sparsify an individual file
(e.g. because it has unstaged changes or conflicts). In such cases,
it can make sense to run git sparse-checkout reapply later after
cleaning up affected paths (e.g. resolving conflicts, undoing or
committing changes, etc.).
disable
Disable the core.sparseCheckout config setting, and restore the
working directory to include all files. Leaves the sparse-checkout
file intact so a later git sparse-checkout init command may return
the working directory to the same state.
SPARSE CHECKOUT
"Sparse checkout" allows populating the working directory sparsely. It
uses the skip-worktree bit (see git-update-index(1)) to tell Git
whether a file in the working directory is worth looking at. If the
skip-worktree bit is set, then the file is ignored in the working
directory. Git will not populate the contents of those files, which
makes a sparse checkout helpful when working in a repository with many
files, but only a few are important to the current user.
The $GIT_DIR/info/sparse-checkout file is used to define the
skip-worktree reference bitmap. When Git updates the working directory,
it updates the skip-worktree bits in the index based on this file. The
files matching the patterns in the file will appear in the working
directory, and the rest will not.
To enable the sparse-checkout feature, run git sparse-checkout init to
initialize a simple sparse-checkout file and enable the
core.sparseCheckout config setting. Then, run git sparse-checkout set
to modify the patterns in the sparse-checkout file.
To repopulate the working directory with all files, use the git
sparse-checkout disable command.
FULL PATTERN SET
By default, the sparse-checkout file uses the same syntax as .gitignore
files.
While $GIT_DIR/info/sparse-checkout is usually used to specify what
files are included, you can also specify what files are not included,
using negative patterns. For example, to remove the file unwanted:
/*
!unwanted
CONE PATTERN SET
The full pattern set allows for arbitrary pattern matches and
complicated inclusion/exclusion rules. These can result in O(N*M)
pattern matches when updating the index, where N is the number of
patterns and M is the number of paths in the index. To combat this
performance issue, a more restricted pattern set is allowed when
core.sparseCheckoutCone is enabled.
The accepted patterns in the cone pattern set are:
1. Recursive: All paths inside a directory are included.
2. Parent: All files immediately inside a directory are included.
In addition to the above two patterns, we also expect that all files in
the root directory are included. If a recursive pattern is added, then
all leading directories are added as parent patterns.
By default, when running git sparse-checkout init, the root directory
is added as a parent pattern. At this point, the sparse-checkout file
contains the following patterns:
/*
!/*/
This says "include everything in root, but nothing two levels below
root."
When in cone mode, the git sparse-checkout set subcommand takes a list
of directories instead of a list of sparse-checkout patterns. In this
mode, the command git sparse-checkout set A/B/C sets the directory
A/B/C as a recursive pattern, the directories A and A/B are added as
parent patterns. The resulting sparse-checkout file is now
/*
!/*/
/A/
!/A/*/
/A/B/
!/A/B/*/
/A/B/C/
Here, order matters, so the negative patterns are overridden by the
positive patterns that appear lower in the file.
If core.sparseCheckoutCone=true, then Git will parse the
sparse-checkout file expecting patterns of these types. Git will warn
if the patterns do not match. If the patterns do match the expected
format, then Git will use faster hash- based algorithms to compute
inclusion in the sparse-checkout.
In the cone mode case, the git sparse-checkout list subcommand will
list the directories that define the recursive patterns. For the
example sparse-checkout file above, the output is as follows:
$ git sparse-checkout list
A/B/C
If core.ignoreCase=true, then the pattern-matching algorithm will use a
case-insensitive check. This corrects for case mismatched filenames in
the git sparse-checkout set command to reflect the expected cone in the
working directory.
When changing the sparse-checkout patterns in cone mode, Git will
inspect each tracked directory that is not within the sparse-checkout
cone to see if it contains any untracked files. If all of those files
are ignored due to the .gitignore patterns, then the directory will be
deleted. If any of the untracked files within that directory is not
ignored, then no deletions will occur within that directory and a
warning message will appear. If these files are important, then reset
your sparse-checkout definition so they are included, use git add and
git commit to store them, then remove any remaining files manually to
ensure Git can behave optimally.
SUBMODULES
If your repository contains one or more submodules, then submodules are
populated based on interactions with the git submodule command.
Specifically, git submodule init -- <path> will ensure the submodule at
<path> is present, while git submodule deinit [-f] -- <path> will
remove the files for the submodule at <path> (including any untracked
files, uncommitted changes, and unpushed history). Similar to how
sparse-checkout removes files from the working tree but still leaves
entries in the index, deinitialized submodules are removed from the
working directory but still have an entry in the index.
Since submodules may have unpushed changes or untracked files, removing
them could result in data loss. Thus, changing sparse
inclusion/exclusion rules will not cause an already checked out
submodule to be removed from the working copy. Said another way, just
as checkout will not cause submodules to be automatically removed or
initialized even when switching between branches that remove or add
submodules, using sparse-checkout to reduce or expand the scope of
"interesting" files will not cause submodules to be automatically
deinitialized or initialized either.
Further, the above facts mean that there are multiple reasons that
"tracked" files might not be present in the working copy: sparsity
pattern application from sparse-checkout, and submodule initialization
state. Thus, commands like git grep that work on tracked files in the
working copy may return results that are limited by either or both of
these restrictions.
SEE ALSO
git-read-tree(1) gitignore(5)
GIT
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Git 2.34.1 01/13/2025 GIT-SPARSE-CHECKOU(1)
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