I'm questioning the overall wisdom of what you describe Lowell. Why not just have a single repository? Doing that eliminates all of the fussing you describe.
If the "other" repos are little more than holding pens for stuff to eventually get merged into your primary repo, then why? this is what branches are for. It sounds as if you're not really taking full advantage of all that Git offers. On Wednesday, February 1, 2017 at 2:58:59 PM UTC-7, Lowell Alleman wrote: > > I have 3 separate air-gapped git repositories (hosted on local GitHub > enterprise) that I'm trying to keep in sync. Currently, I'm using "git > bundle" to push revisions back and forth, which worked fairly well with > just 2 repositories, but I'm struggling a bit since the 3rd (and final) > repository has been added to the mix. I was using a single tag to track > the point of last export as noted in the "git bundle" docs, but I'm > struggling to make that scale with 2+ total repositories. > > In terms of information flow, we've deemed one of the repositories as > "primary" and the other two as "secondary" repositories. So in a sense we > are using the "primary" repository like a development and merging area so > that all changes go through the primary repository and trickle down to the > secondary repositories. Changes are always pushed upstream to primary, and > then synced down to the other secondary repository. > > Please note that our use of git is more like a "versioned file system" > than the typical developer use case. I go on to explain that a bit more > later, but wanted to get to my main question before everyone gives up on > reading this really long and complicated explanation of the mess I made. > > *Q: Does anyone know of any existing scripts, documented methods, or best > practices to follow when syncing a branch between multiple air-gapped > repositories?* > > *How we are using git:* As noted above, this is NOT a typical > development-centered use-case. Branching is very infrequent, and most work > is done on the "master" branch in each repository. Unlike typical > developer-centric approaches, each clone (working copy) ends up tied to a > specific server, rather than a single developer. So multiple users end up > working in the same working copy and committing code from one place. The > team is small and the changes are infrequent enough that this works for us, > despite the atypical and less-than-ideal use case. > > *How we are using branches:* We treat each repository as if it has just > one branch, a single "master". However, because of the synchronization > requirements, we create special purpose branches in each repository that > essentially mirror the master branches of the other repositories. So the > primary repository has 2 mirrored branches, one for each of the secondary > repositories. And each secondary repository has a single mirrored branch > that represents the primary (upstream) repository. (By convention, we have > agreed never to synchronize revisions directly between the two secondary > repositories.) Local changes are never applied to a mirrored repository > branch, so that it should match the "master" branch of the mirrored > repository exactly. (That is, the only changes to these mirrored branches > are fast-forward only "pull"s made from bundle files exported from > the mirrored repository.) The process of merging changes between branches > is manual, and I think I want to keep it that way for the foreseeable > future. (Perhaps one day I'll make fast-forward merges apply > automatically, but in general I want a human to be responsible for this > step.) So while each repositories' "master" branch may diverge, or at > least have a slightly different history, in the end, they should all end up > with the same content. Well, at least that's the ultimate goal. > > *File transfer: *Transferring bundle files between air-gapped > environments involve multiple human steps including content review, > approval, and some safety checks for compliance. Therefore, there's no way > to automatically schedule synchronization, which is a bummer. That being > said, I'd like to make this as painless as possible within the realm of > what I can control. I'm looking to create import and export scripts (or > find existing ones to borrow from) that handle bundle creation and the > import process. > > I'm looking for a little help designing an appropriate synchronization > solution, and would appreciate any feedback you may have. The combination > of using git bundle and our non-traditional use case has made it difficult > to find relevant resources. If there is anything I've missed, please point > me in the right direction. > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Git for human beings" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to git-users+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
