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Diffstat (limited to 'Documentation/technical')
| -rw-r--r-- | Documentation/technical/index-format.txt | 12 |
1 files changed, 12 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/technical/index-format.txt b/Documentation/technical/index-format.txt index 3b74c05647..65da0daaa5 100644 --- a/Documentation/technical/index-format.txt +++ b/Documentation/technical/index-format.txt @@ -392,3 +392,15 @@ The remaining data of each directory block is grouped by type: in this block of entries. - 32-bit count of cache entries in this block + +== Sparse Directory Entries + + When using sparse-checkout in cone mode, some entire directories within + the index can be summarized by pointing to a tree object instead of the + entire expanded list of paths within that tree. An index containing such + entries is a "sparse index". Index format versions 4 and less were not + implemented with such entries in mind. Thus, for these versions, an + index containing sparse directory entries will include this extension + with signature { 's', 'd', 'i', 'r' }. Like the split-index extension, + tools should avoid interacting with a sparse index unless they understand + this extension. |