gc your git repositories automatically with a cron task

09 Dec 2011

I have a lot of git code repositories, and I usually gc (garbage collect) them manually by running the git gc command every now and then. Tasks like these are prime candidates for automating with cron. Below is a cron entry and the script which gcs my repositories. Hope you guys find it useful.

the script

#!/bin/bash
#author: Khaja Minhajuddin
#email: minhajuddin.k@gmail.com
#path /home/minhajuddin/.cron/reboot.sh
#description: script which is executed everytime computer starts

#git gc repos
REPO_DIRS=$(cat <<EOS
$HOME/repos
$HOME/repos/core
EOS
)

for repo_dir in $REPO_DIRS
do
  echo "checking for git repos in $repo_dir"
  for repo in $(ls $repo_dir)
  do
    cd $repo_dir/$repo
    if [[ -d .git ]]
    then
      echo "garbage collecting $repo"
      git gc
    fi
  done
done

the crontab entry

$ crontab -e
#add the line below into the editor and save it
@reboot   $HOME/.cron/reboot.sh

Bonus tip: If you have a gitosis server, put the following script at ~git/.cron/reboot.sh and perform the above step for your git user.

the gitosis git user script

#!/bin/bash

for repo in $(ls ~/repositories)
do
  cd ~/repositories/$repo
  echo "garbage collecting $repo"
  git gc
done