# share

Contents

- Description
  - Automatic Pooled Storage for Clones
- Commands
  - Repository creation
  - Repository maintenance

share a common history between several working directories

# Description

The share extension introduces a new command `hg share` to create a new working directory. This is similar to `hg clone`, but doesn't involve copying or linking the storage of the repository. This allows working on different branches or changes in parallel without the associated cost in terms of disk space.

Note: destructive operations or extensions like `hg rollback` should be used with care as they can result in confusing problems.

## Automatic Pooled Storage for Clones

When this extension is active, `hg clone` can be configured to automatically share/pool storage across multiple clones. This mode effectively converts `hg clone` to `hg clone` + `hg share`. The benefit of using this mode is the automatic management of store paths and intelligent pooling of related repositories.

The following `share.` config options influence this feature:

`share.pool`
  Filesystem path where shared repository data will be stored. When defined, `hg clone` will automatically use shared repository storage instead of creating a store inside each clone.
`share.poolnaming`

  How directory names in `share.pool` are constructed.

  "identity" means the name is derived from the first changeset in the repository. In this mode, different remotes share storage if their root/initial changeset is identical. In this mode, the local shared repository is an aggregate of all encountered remote repositories.

  "remote" means the name is derived from the source repository's path or URL. In this mode, storage is only shared if the path or URL requested in the `hg clone` command matches exactly to a repository that was cloned before.

  The default naming mode is "identity".

Sharing requirements and configs of source repository with shares:

By default creating a shared repository only enables sharing a common history and does not share requirements and configs between them. This may lead to problems in some cases, for example when you upgrade the storage format from one repository but does not set related configs in the shares.

Setting format.exp-share-safe = True enables sharing configs and requirements. This only applies to shares which are done after enabling the config option.

For enabling this in existing shares, enable the config option and reshare.

For resharing existing shares, make sure your working directory is clean and there are no untracked files, delete that share and create a new share.

# Commands

## Repository creation

### share

create a new shared repository:

    hg share [-U] [-B] SOURCE [DEST]

Initialize a new repository and working directory that shares its history (and optionally bookmarks) with another repository.

Note

using rollback or extensions that destroy/modify history (mq, rebase, etc.) can cause considerable confusion with shared clones. In particular, if two shared clones are both updated to the same changeset, and one of them destroys that changeset with rollback, the other clone will suddenly stop working: all operations will fail with "abort: working directory has unknown parent". The only known workaround is to use debugsetparents on the broken clone to reset it to a changeset that still exists.

Options:

`-U, --noupdate` | do not create a working directory
`-B, --bookmarks`
| also share bookmarks
`--relative` | point to source using a relative path

## Repository maintenance

### unshare

convert a shared repository to a normal one:

    hg unshare

Copy the store data to the repo and remove the sharedpath data.