How to version the .git/config file?

Question

I have a .gitignore file like the following:

.*
!.gitignore

And I would like to version my .git/config file such that when I do a git pull my .git/config file updates automatically.

How can I do this?

I tried something like:

.*
!.gitignore
!.git/config

But this didn't work. I know if I create a link ( ln -s .git/config configurations/git/config ) I can version it, but I would like a better way to update the original one automatically.

I'm thinking of creating a hard link to it ( ln .git/config configurations/git/config configuration/git ), but it doesn't appear to be the best way. Is there a way to avoid this? Will Git work properly when versioning hard links?

Edit: explaining why to do this

The main motivation to do this is that I would like to version the home folder of a user of mine. I will use this versioning to help me on some kind of deploys. I'd like to keep all clones synchronized. Conflicts will appear just if I don't manage the things well, and I'll be taking care of this. Maybe I will be versioning another protected git files too.

Answer 1

You can't 'version' your .git/config file. What you can do is create a .gitconfig in your working directory and commit that. Then after a clone you perform.

  cat .gitconfig >> .git/config

Of course, this is fraught with all sorts of potential problems . What if somebody edits .gitconfig ? You'd need to undo .git/config and then re-append after git pull . What if .gitconfig changes on a different branch? You'd need to undo .git/config and re-append on git checkout <branch>

So, I'm not recommending changing .git/config ; but if you must, you must.

Answer 2

As stated by @Tuxdude it is bad information to share .git/config itself.

But Git (1.7.10+) now supports config inclusion !

So, for important options you may said place them in file: .git.config/repository.config and in .git/config just place link to it like:

[include]
        path = ../.git.config/repository.config

I just add such recommendation in readme file for repo. It much easy to just copy/paste many lines and versioning important settings like regular file. It also transfer updates for all users of repo.

Answer 3

It is a bad idea to version your .git/config file.

git doesn't let you version anything under the .git directory because the contents of the .git are local to your repo, and 2 people cloning from the same remote URL, need not have the same set of files under the .git directory after the clone.

For example, you might just have a single remote named origin while the other developer might have named the remote something like foo instead. Another developer might have 2 remotes named bar and baz .

The info about remotes (URLs, refspec, etc.), local branches (like upstream tracking branch, etc.), are stored in your .git/config file.

If you really need to override some configuration, you can edit the .git/config file locally or if it is an option that you could set globally use your ~/.gitconfig or equivalent.

Answer 4

To add to the already excellent answers, and to actually answer the OP's question:

I'm thinking of creating a hard link to it ( ln .git/config configurations/git/config configuration/git ), but it doesn't appear to be the best way.
Is there a way to avoid this?
Will Git work properly when versioning hard links?

No:

• hard links aren't represented in Git: see " Git and hard links "
• Symlinks would simply be stored as text file with the path of the linked file.