git-filter-repo/INSTALL.md

Installation via Package Manager

Installation is as easy as

$ PACKAGE_TOOL install git-filter-repo

for those using one of the following package managers to install software on their system:

This list covers at least Windows (Scoop), Mac OS X (Homebrew), and Linux (most the rest). Note that I do not curate this list (and have no interest in doing so); https://repology.org tracks who packages these versions.

Manual Installation

filter-repo only consists of a few files that need to be installed:

• git-filter-repo

  This is the only thing needed for basic use.

  This can be installed in the directory pointed to by git --exec-path, or placed anywhere in $PATH.

  If your python3 executable is named "python" instead of "python3" (this particularly appears to affect a number of Windows users), then you'll also need to modify the first line of git-filter-repo to replace "python3" with "python".

• git_filter_repo.py

  This is needed if you want to make use of one of the scripts in contrib/filter-repo-demos/, or want to write your own script making use of filter-repo as a python library.

  You can create this symlink to (or copy of) git-filter-repo named git_filter-repo.py and place it in your python site packages; python -c "import site; print(site.getsitepackages())" may help you find the appropriate location for your system. Alternatively, you can place this file anywhere within $PYTHONPATH.

• git-filter-repo.1

  This is needed if you want git filter-repo --help to succeed in displaying the manpage, when help.format is "man" (the default on Linux and Mac).

  This can be installed in the directory pointed to by $(git --man-path)/man1/, or placed anywhere in $MANDIR/man1/ where $MANDIR is some entry from $MANPATH.

  Note that git filter-repo -h will show a more limited built-in set of instructions regardless of whether the manpage is installed.

• git-filter-repo.html

  This is needed if you want git filter-repo --help to succeed in displaying the html version of the help, when help.format is set to "html" (the default on Windows).

  This can be installed in the directory pointed to by git --html-path.

  Note that git filter-repo -h will show a more limited built-in set of instructions regardless of whether the html version of help is installed.

So, installation might look something like

cp -a git-filter-repo $(git --exec-path)
cp -a git-filter-repo.1 $(git --man-path)/man1
cp -a git-filter-repo.html $(git --html-path)
ln -s $(git --exec-path)/git-filter-repo \
    $(python -c "import site; print(site.getsitepackages()[-1])")/git_filter_repo.py

Installation via pip

For those who prefer to install python packages via pip, you merely need to run:

$ pip3 install git-filter-repo

Installation via Makefile

Installing should be doable by hand, but a Makefile is provided for those that prefer it. However, usage of the Makefile really requires overridding at least a couple of the directories with sane values, e.g.

$ make prefix=/usr pythondir=/usr/lib64/python3.8/site-packages install

Also, the Makefile will not edit the shebang line (the first line) of git-filter-repo if your python executable is not named "python3"; you'll still need to do that yourself.