git-maintenance(1)

# git-maintenance(1) Manual Page

## NAME

git-maintenance - Run tasks to optimize Git repository data

## SYNOPSIS

    git maintenance run [<options>]
    git maintenance start [--scheduler=<scheduler>]
    git maintenance (stop|register|unregister) [<options>]
    git maintenance is-needed [<options>]

## DESCRIPTION

Run tasks to optimize Git repository data, speeding up other Git commands and reducing storage requirements for the repository.

Git commands that add repository data, such as `git` `add` or `git` `fetch`, are optimized for a responsive user experience. These commands do not take time to optimize the Git data, since such optimizations scale with the full size of the repository while these user commands each perform a relatively small action.

The `git` `maintenance` command provides flexibility for how to optimize the Git repository.

## SUBCOMMANDS

run

  Run one or more maintenance tasks. If one or more `--task` options are specified, then those tasks are run in that order. Otherwise, the tasks are determined by which `maintenance.`<task>`.enabled` config options are true. By default, only `maintenance.gc.enabled` is true.

start

  Start running maintenance on the current repository. This performs the same config updates as the `register` subcommand, then updates the background scheduler to run `git` `maintenance` `run` `--scheduled` on an hourly basis.

stop

  Halt the background maintenance schedule. The current repository is not removed from the list of maintained repositories, in case the background maintenance is restarted later.

register

  Initialize Git config values so any scheduled maintenance will start running on this repository. This adds the repository to the `maintenance.repo` config variable in the current user’s global config, or the config specified by --config-file option, and enables some recommended configuration values for `maintenance.`<task>`.schedule`. The tasks that are enabled are safe for running in the background without disrupting foreground processes.

  The `register` subcommand will also set the `maintenance.strategy` config value to `incremental`, if this value is not previously set. The `incremental` strategy uses the following schedule for each maintenance task:

  - `gc`: disabled.

  - `commit-graph`: hourly.

  - `prefetch`: hourly.

  - `loose-objects`: daily.

  - `incremental-repack`: daily.

  `git` `maintenance` `register` will also disable foreground maintenance by setting `maintenance.auto` `=` `false` in the current repository. This config setting will remain after a `git` `maintenance` `unregister` command.

unregister

  Remove the current repository from background maintenance. This only removes the repository from the configured list. It does not stop the background maintenance processes from running.

  The `unregister` subcommand will report an error if the current repository is not already registered. Use the `--force` option to return success even when the current repository is not registered.

is-needed

  Check whether maintenance needs to be run without actually running it. Exits with a 0 status code if maintenance needs to be run, 1 otherwise. Ideally used with the --auto flag.

  If one or more `--task` options are specified, then those tasks are checked in that order. Otherwise, the tasks are determined by which `maintenance.`<task>`.enabled` config options are true. By default, only `maintenance.gc.enabled` is true.

## TASKS

commit-graph

  The `commit-graph` job updates the `commit-graph` files incrementally, then verifies that the written data is correct. The incremental write is safe to run alongside concurrent Git processes since it will not expire .`graph` files that were in the previous `commit-graph-chain` file. They will be deleted by a later run based on the expiration delay.

prefetch

  The `prefetch` task updates the object directory with the latest objects from all registered remotes. For each remote, a `git` `fetch` command is run. The configured refspec is modified to place all requested refs within `refs/prefetch/`. Also, tags are not updated.

  This is done to avoid disrupting the remote-tracking branches. The end users expect these refs to stay unmoved unless they initiate a fetch. However, with the prefetch task, the objects necessary to complete a later real fetch would already be obtained, making the real fetch faster. In the ideal case, it will just become an update to a bunch of remote-tracking branches without any object transfer.

  The `remote.`<name>`.skipFetchAll` configuration can be used to exclude a particular remote from getting prefetched.

gc

  Clean up unnecessary files and optimize the local repository. "GC" stands for "garbage collection," but this task performs many smaller tasks. This task can be expensive for large repositories, as it repacks all Git objects into a single pack-file. It can also be disruptive in some situations, as it deletes stale data. See git-gc(1) for more details on garbage collection in Git.

loose-objects

  The `loose-objects` job cleans up loose objects and places them into pack-files. In order to prevent race conditions with concurrent Git commands, it follows a two-step process. First, it deletes any loose objects that already exist in a pack-file; concurrent Git processes will examine the pack-file for the object data instead of the loose object. Second, it creates a new pack-file (starting with "loose-") containing a batch of loose objects.

  The batch size defaults to fifty thousand objects to prevent the job from taking too long on a repository with many loose objects. Use the `maintenance.loose-objects.batchSize` config option to adjust this size, including a value of `0` to remove the limit.

  The `gc` task writes unreachable objects as loose objects to be cleaned up by a later step only if they are not re-added to a pack-file; for this reason it is not advisable to enable both the `loose-objects` and `gc` tasks at the same time.

incremental-repack

  The `incremental-repack` job repacks the object directory using the `multi-pack-index` feature. In order to prevent race conditions with concurrent Git commands, it follows a two-step process. First, it calls `git` `multi-pack-index` `expire` to delete pack-files unreferenced by the `multi-pack-index` file. Second, it calls `git` `multi-pack-index` `repack` to select several small pack-files and repack them into a bigger one, and then update the `multi-pack-index` entries that refer to the small pack-files to refer to the new pack-file. This prepares those small pack-files for deletion upon the next run of `git` `multi-pack-index` `expire`. The selection of the small pack-files is such that the expected size of the big pack-file is at least the batch size; see the `--batch-size` option for the `repack` subcommand in git-multi-pack-index(1). The default batch-size is zero, which is a special case that attempts to repack all pack-files into a single pack-file.

pack-refs

  The `pack-refs` task collects the loose reference files and collects them into a single file. This speeds up operations that need to iterate across many references. See git-pack-refs(1) for more information.

reflog-expire

  The `reflog-expire` task deletes any entries in the reflog older than the expiry threshold. See git-reflog(1) for more information.

rerere-gc

  The `rerere-gc` task invokes garbage collection for stale entries in the rerere cache. See git-rerere(1) for more information.

worktree-prune

  The `worktree-prune` task deletes stale or broken worktrees. See git-worktree(1) for more information.

## OPTIONS

--auto

  When combined with the `run` subcommand, run maintenance tasks only if certain thresholds are met. For example, the `gc` task runs when the number of loose objects exceeds the number stored in the `gc.auto` config setting, or when the number of pack-files exceeds the `gc.autoPackLimit` config setting. Not compatible with the `--schedule` option. When combined with the `is-needed` subcommand, check if the required thresholds are met without actually running maintenance.

--schedule

  When combined with the `run` subcommand, run maintenance tasks only if certain time conditions are met, as specified by the `maintenance.`<task>`.schedule` config value for each <task>. This config value specifies a number of seconds since the last time that task ran, according to the `maintenance.`<task>`.lastRun` config value. The tasks that are tested are those provided by the `--task=`<task> option(s) or those with `maintenance.`<task>`.enabled` set to true.

--quiet

  Do not report progress or other information over `stderr`.

--task=<task>

  If this option is specified one or more times, then only run the specified tasks in the specified order. If no `--task=`<task> arguments are specified, then only the tasks with `maintenance.`<task>`.enabled` configured as `true` are considered. See the TASKS section for the list of accepted <task> values.

--scheduler=auto|crontab|systemd-timer|launchctl|schtasks

  When combined with the `start` subcommand, specify the scheduler for running the hourly, daily and weekly executions of `git` `maintenance` `run`. Possible values for <scheduler> are `auto`, `crontab` (POSIX), `systemd-timer` (Linux), `launchctl` (macOS), and `schtasks` (Windows). When `auto` is specified, the appropriate platform-specific scheduler is used; on Linux, `systemd-timer` is used if available, otherwise `crontab`. Default is `auto`.

## TROUBLESHOOTING

The `git` `maintenance` command is designed to simplify the repository maintenance patterns while minimizing user wait time during Git commands. A variety of configuration options are available to allow customizing this process. The default maintenance options focus on operations that complete quickly, even on large repositories.

Users may find some cases where scheduled maintenance tasks do not run as frequently as intended. Each `git` `maintenance` `run` command takes a lock on the repository’s object database, and this prevents other concurrent `git` `maintenance` `run` commands from running on the same repository. Without this safeguard, competing processes could leave the repository in an unpredictable state.

The background maintenance schedule runs `git` `maintenance` `run` processes on an hourly basis. Each run executes the "hourly" tasks. At midnight, that process also executes the "daily" tasks. At midnight on the first day of the week, that process also executes the "weekly" tasks. A single process iterates over each registered repository, performing the scheduled tasks for that frequency. The processes are scheduled to a random minute of the hour per client to spread out the load that multiple clients might generate (e.g. from prefetching). Depending on the number of registered repositories and their sizes, this process may take longer than an hour. In this case, multiple `git` `maintenance` `run` commands may run on the same repository at the same time, colliding on the object database lock. This results in one of the two tasks not running.

If you find that some maintenance windows are taking longer than one hour to complete, then consider reducing the complexity of your maintenance tasks. For example, the `gc` task is much slower than the `incremental-repack` task. However, this comes at a cost of a slightly larger object database. Consider moving more expensive tasks to be run less frequently.

Expert users may consider scheduling their own maintenance tasks using a different schedule than is available through `git` `maintenance` `start` and Git configuration options. These users should be aware of the object database lock and how concurrent `git` `maintenance` `run` commands behave. Further, the `git` `gc` command should not be combined with `git` `maintenance` `run` commands. `git` `gc` modifies the object database but does not take the lock in the same way as `git` `maintenance` `run`. If possible, use `git` `maintenance` `run` `--task=gc` instead of `git` `gc`.

The following sections describe the mechanisms put in place to run background maintenance by `git` `maintenance` `start` and how to customize them.

## BACKGROUND MAINTENANCE ON POSIX SYSTEMS

The standard mechanism for scheduling background tasks on POSIX systems is cron(8). This tool executes commands based on a given schedule. The current list of user-scheduled tasks can be found by running `crontab` `-l`. The schedule written by `git` `maintenance` `start` is similar to this:

    # BEGIN GIT MAINTENANCE SCHEDULE
    # The following schedule was created by Git
    # Any edits made in this region might be
    # replaced in the future by a Git command.

    0 1-23 * * * "/<path>/git" --exec-path="/<path>" for-each-repo --config=maintenance.repo maintenance run --schedule=hourly
    0 0 * * 1-6 "/<path>/git" --exec-path="/<path>" for-each-repo --config=maintenance.repo maintenance run --schedule=daily
    0 0 * * 0 "/<path>/git" --exec-path="/<path>" for-each-repo --config=maintenance.repo maintenance run --schedule=weekly

    # END GIT MAINTENANCE SCHEDULE

The comments are used as a region to mark the schedule as written by Git. Any modifications within this region will be completely deleted by `git` `maintenance` `stop` or overwritten by `git` `maintenance` `start`.

The `crontab` entry specifies the full path of the `git` executable to ensure that the executed `git` command is the same one with which `git` `maintenance` `start` was issued independent of `PATH`. If the same user runs `git` `maintenance` `start` with multiple Git executables, then only the latest executable is used.

These commands use `git` `for-each-repo` `--config=maintenance.repo` to run `git` `maintenance` `run` `--schedule=`<frequency> on each repository listed in the multi-valued `maintenance.repo` config option. These are typically loaded from the user-specific global config. The `git` `maintenance` process then determines which maintenance tasks are configured to run on each repository with each <frequency> using the `maintenance.`<task>`.schedule` config options. These values are loaded from the global or repository config values.

If the config values are insufficient to achieve your desired background maintenance schedule, then you can create your own schedule. If you run `crontab` `-e`, then an editor will load with your user-specific `cron` schedule. In that editor, you can add your own schedule lines. You could start by adapting the default schedule listed earlier, or you could read the crontab(5) documentation for advanced scheduling techniques. Please do use the full path and `--exec-path` techniques from the default schedule to ensure you are executing the correct binaries in your schedule.

## BACKGROUND MAINTENANCE ON LINUX SYSTEMD SYSTEMS

While Linux supports `cron`, depending on the distribution, `cron` may be an optional package not necessarily installed. On modern Linux distributions, systemd timers are superseding it.

If user systemd timers are available, they will be used as a replacement of `cron`.

In this case, `git` `maintenance` `start` will create user systemd timer units and start the timers. The current list of user-scheduled tasks can be found by running `systemctl` `--user` `list-timers`. The timers written by `git` `maintenance` `start` are similar to this:

    $ systemctl --user list-timers
    NEXT                         LEFT          LAST                         PASSED     UNIT                         ACTIVATES
    Thu 2021-04-29 19:00:00 CEST 42min left    Thu 2021-04-29 18:00:11 CEST 17min ago  git-maintenance@hourly.timer git-maintenance@hourly.service
    Fri 2021-04-30 00:00:00 CEST 5h 42min left Thu 2021-04-29 00:00:11 CEST 18h ago    git-maintenance@daily.timer  git-maintenance@daily.service
    Mon 2021-05-03 00:00:00 CEST 3 days left   Mon 2021-04-26 00:00:11 CEST 3 days ago git-maintenance@weekly.timer git-maintenance@weekly.service

One timer is registered for each `--schedule=`<frequency> option.

The definition of the systemd units can be inspected in the following files:

    ~/.config/systemd/user/git-maintenance@.timer
    ~/.config/systemd/user/git-maintenance@.service
    ~/.config/systemd/user/timers.target.wants/git-maintenance@hourly.timer
    ~/.config/systemd/user/timers.target.wants/git-maintenance@daily.timer
    ~/.config/systemd/user/timers.target.wants/git-maintenance@weekly.timer

`git` `maintenance` `start` will overwrite these files and start the timer again with `systemctl` `--user`, so any customization should be done by creating a drop-in file, i.e. a .`conf` suffixed file in the `~/.config/systemd/user/git-maintenance@.service.d` directory.

`git` `maintenance` `stop` will stop the user systemd timers and delete the above mentioned files.

For more details, see `systemd.timer`(`5`).

## BACKGROUND MAINTENANCE ON MACOS SYSTEMS

While macOS technically supports `cron`, using `crontab` `-e` requires elevated privileges and the executed process does not have a full user context. Without a full user context, Git and its credential helpers cannot access stored credentials, so some maintenance tasks are not functional.

Instead, `git` `maintenance` `start` interacts with the `launchctl` tool, which is the recommended way to schedule timed jobs in macOS. Scheduling maintenance through `git` `maintenance` (`start`|`stop`) requires some `launchctl` features available only in macOS 10.11 or later.

Your user-specific scheduled tasks are stored as XML-formatted .`plist` files in `~/Library/LaunchAgents/`. You can see the currently-registered tasks using the following command:

    $ ls ~/Library/LaunchAgents/org.git-scm.git*
    org.git-scm.git.daily.plist
    org.git-scm.git.hourly.plist
    org.git-scm.git.weekly.plist

One task is registered for each `--schedule=`<frequency> option. To inspect how the XML format describes each schedule, open one of these .`plist` files in an editor and inspect the <array> element following the <key>`StartCalendarInterval`</key> element.

`git` `maintenance` `start` will overwrite these files and register the tasks again with `launchctl`, so any customizations should be done by creating your own .`plist` files with distinct names. Similarly, the `git` `maintenance` `stop` command will unregister the tasks with `launchctl` and delete the .`plist` files.

To create more advanced customizations to your background tasks, see launchctl.plist(5) for more information.

## BACKGROUND MAINTENANCE ON WINDOWS SYSTEMS

Windows does not support `cron` and instead has its own system for scheduling background tasks. The `git` `maintenance` `start` command uses the `schtasks` command to submit tasks to this system. You can inspect all background tasks using the Task Scheduler application. The tasks added by Git have names of the form `Git` `Maintenance` (<frequency>). The Task Scheduler GUI has ways to inspect these tasks, but you can also export the tasks to XML files and view the details there.

Note that since Git is a console application, these background tasks create a console window visible to the current user. This can be changed manually by selecting the "Run whether user is logged in or not" option in Task Scheduler. This change requires a password input, which is why `git` `maintenance` `start` does not select it by default.

If you want to customize the background tasks, please rename the tasks so future calls to `git` `maintenance` (`start`|`stop`) do not overwrite your custom tasks.

## CONFIGURATION

Everything below this line in this section is selectively included from the git-config(1) documentation. The content is the same as what’s found there:

maintenance.auto

  This boolean config option controls whether some commands run `git` `maintenance` `run` `--auto` after doing their normal work. Defaults to true.

maintenance.autoDetach

  Many Git commands trigger automatic maintenance after they have written data into the repository. This boolean config option controls whether this automatic maintenance shall happen in the foreground or whether the maintenance process shall detach and continue to run in the background.

  If unset, the value of `gc.autoDetach` is used as a fallback. Defaults to true if both are unset, meaning that the maintenance process will detach.

maintenance.strategy

  This string config option provides a way to specify one of a few recommended strategies for repository maintenance. This affects which tasks are run during `git` `maintenance` `run`, provided no `--task=`<task> arguments are provided. This setting impacts manual maintenance, auto-maintenance as well as scheduled maintenance. The tasks that run may be different depending on the maintenance type.

  The maintenance strategy can be further tweaked by setting `maintenance.`<task>`.enabled` and `maintenance.`<task>`.schedule`. If set, these values are used instead of the defaults provided by `maintenance.strategy`.

  The possible strategies are:

  - `none`: This strategy implies no tasks are run at all. This is the default strategy for scheduled maintenance.

  - `gc`: This strategy runs the `gc` task. This is the default strategy for manual maintenance.

  - `geometric`: This strategy performs geometric repacking of packfiles and keeps auxiliary data structures up-to-date. The strategy expires data in the reflog and removes worktrees that cannot be located anymore. When the geometric repacking strategy would decide to do an all-into-one repack, then the strategy generates a cruft pack for all unreachable objects. Objects that are already part of a cruft pack will be expired.

    This repacking strategy is a full replacement for the `gc` strategy and is recommended for large repositories.

  - `incremental`: This setting optimizes for performing small maintenance activities that do not delete any data. This does not schedule the `gc` task, but runs the `prefetch` and `commit-graph` tasks hourly, the `loose-objects` and `incremental-repack` tasks daily, and the `pack-refs` task weekly. Manual repository maintenance uses the `gc` task.

maintenance.<task>.enabled

  This boolean config option controls whether the maintenance task with name <task> is run when no `--task` option is specified to `git` `maintenance` `run`. These config values are ignored if a `--task` option exists. By default, only `maintenance.gc.enabled` is true.

maintenance.<task>.schedule

  This config option controls whether or not the given <task> runs during a `git` `maintenance` `run` `--schedule=`<frequency> command. The value must be one of "hourly", "daily", or "weekly".

maintenance.commit-graph.auto

  This integer config option controls how often the `commit-graph` task should be run as part of `git` `maintenance` `run` `--auto`. If zero, then the `commit-graph` task will not run with the `--auto` option. A negative value will force the task to run every time. Otherwise, a positive value implies the command should run when the number of reachable commits that are not in the commit-graph file is at least the value of `maintenance.commit-graph.auto`. The default value is 100.

maintenance.loose-objects.auto

  This integer config option controls how often the `loose-objects` task should be run as part of `git` `maintenance` `run` `--auto`. If zero, then the `loose-objects` task will not run with the `--auto` option. A negative value will force the task to run every time. Otherwise, a positive value implies the command should run when the number of loose objects is at least the value of `maintenance.loose-objects.auto`. The default value is 100.

maintenance.loose-objects.batchSize

  This integer config option controls the maximum number of loose objects written into a packfile during the `loose-objects` task. The default is fifty thousand. Use value `0` to indicate no limit.

maintenance.incremental-repack.auto

  This integer config option controls how often the `incremental-repack` task should be run as part of `git` `maintenance` `run` `--auto`. If zero, then the `incremental-repack` task will not run with the `--auto` option. A negative value will force the task to run every time. Otherwise, a positive value implies the command should run when the number of pack-files not in the multi-pack-index is at least the value of `maintenance.incremental-repack.auto`. The default value is 10.

maintenance.geometric-repack.auto

  This integer config option controls how often the `geometric-repack` task should be run as part of `git` `maintenance` `run` `--auto`. If zero, then the `geometric-repack` task will not run with the `--auto` option. A negative value will force the task to run every time. Otherwise, a positive value implies the command should run either when there are packfiles that need to be merged together to retain the geometric progression, or when there are at least this many loose objects that would be written into a new packfile. The default value is 100.

maintenance.geometric-repack.splitFactor

  This integer config option controls the factor used for the geometric sequence. See the `--geometric=` option in git-repack(1) for more details. Defaults to `2`.

maintenance.reflog-expire.auto

  This integer config option controls how often the `reflog-expire` task should be run as part of `git` `maintenance` `run` `--auto`. If zero, then the `reflog-expire` task will not run with the `--auto` option. A negative value will force the task to run every time. Otherwise, a positive value implies the command should run when the number of expired reflog entries in the "HEAD" reflog is at least the value of `maintenance.loose-objects.auto`. The default value is 100.

maintenance.rerere-gc.auto

  This integer config option controls how often the `rerere-gc` task should be run as part of `git` `maintenance` `run` `--auto`. If zero, then the `rerere-gc` task will not run with the `--auto` option. A negative value will force the task to run every time. Otherwise, any positive value implies the command will run when the "rr-cache" directory exists and has at least one entry, regardless of whether it is stale or not. This heuristic may be refined in the future. The default value is 1.

maintenance.worktree-prune.auto

  This integer config option controls how often the `worktree-prune` task should be run as part of `git` `maintenance` `run` `--auto`. If zero, then the `worktree-prune` task will not run with the `--auto` option. A negative value will force the task to run every time. Otherwise, a positive value implies the command should run when the number of prunable worktrees exceeds the value. The default value is 1.

## GIT

Part of the git(1) suite