git-sfs (Git-Shit File Storage)

A set of simple C++ programs to circumvent Git LFS metering by unpacking/packing large files to/from small chunks.

Setup

To setup git-sfs for your repository, do the following:

1. Download the latest release from the Releases page and place the contents in the root directory of your repository.
2. Configure git-sfs by editing sfs_settings.txt. Its format is as follows:

<gitignore path>
<gitignore sfs marker>
<chunk size (bytes)>
<sfs chunk extension>

The default configuration (setup for GitHub) is as follows:

.gitignore
# :!git-sfs
103809024
sfs

3. Add SFS files to your root .gitignore by putting them at the bottom of the file below a .gitignore sfs marker line. With default settings, this would look like so:

<rest of gitignore>
...
# :!git-sfs
path/to/file1
path/to/file2
path/to/file3
path/to/file4

4. If you were using LFS before, make sure SFS files are actually ignored by Git.

Usage

To use git-sfs, run either of the executables, sfs-unpack or sfs-pack (+.exe on Windows).

• sfs-unpack: Takes all SFS files (defined in .gitignore) and splits them into chunk files of the chunk size. This makes them able to be committed.
  • Chunk files are named like so: <filename>.<chunk num>.<chunk extension>
• sfs-pack: Takes all SFS chunk files and packs them into their corresponding SFS file. This updates or creates the SFS file.

The intended usage of these executables is as such:

• sfs-unpack: Run before committing after changing an SFS file/s.
• sfs-pack: Run after pulling changes to SFS files.
  • If the contents of the files is not important for what you're doing, you don't have to run sfs-pack.