Summary

Original issue: #1171. See also #11813
Implementation: #13252
Documentation: https://doc.rust-lang.org/nightly/cargo/reference/unstable.html#git

-Zgit is a collection of new Git features in Cargo. Currently we have experiments on

• Shallow clones for git dependencies
• Shallow clones for registry indexes

Unresolved Issues

• No native support of local file shallow clones for either gitoxide or libgit2
  • built-in support for the file protocol GitoxideLabs/gitoxide#734
  • Shallow clones don't seem to work for local clones libgit2/libgit2#6634
• Add tests for git2 shallow clones. This is blocked on the support of file: protocol.
  • gitoxide also shells out to git CLI when talking to file protocol. We might want to add some container based tests for testing non-file remote protocols for shallow clones.
• libgit2 bug: Git clone with depth 1 fails with code -20 git2-rs#1084
  • Fixed in libgit2 v1.9.0
• Is *-shallow directory layout optimal? Can we avoid that but remain compatible?
  • Perhaps switch to bare repos together? Index: use a bare repository rather than a non-bare repository without checkout #9503
• net.git-fetch-with-cli supports shallow fetch Support shallow fetch through net.git-fetch-with-cli #14956

Future Extensions

See "Future Extensions" in #11813. Most of them depend on upstream features in libgit2.

About tracking issues

Tracking issues are used to record the overall progress of implementation.
They are also used as hubs connecting to other relevant issues, e.g., bugs or open design questions.
A tracking issue is however not meant for large scale discussion, questions, or bug reports about a feature.
Instead, open a dedicated issue for the specific matter and add the relevant feature gate label.