Question

I have several backup dirs I want to put them into git.

The dirs are:

web_backup_2012-03-07
web_backup_2012-06-03
web_backup_2012-06-21
web_backup_2012-06-25
web_backup_2012-07-02
web_backup_2012-07-15
web_backup_2012-07-21

now I want to put them on git. What’s the best way?
(each backup is about 1.1 G, 20k files.)

Here’s what I think should do:

• cd to the earliest backup dir.

git init
git add .
git commit . -m"initial commit"

then move the .git dir into the second dir, then do

git add .
git commit . -m"commit. ‹date here›"

repeat the above.

Then, when in the last dir, I’m done. I can delete all previous backup dirs. (I can then move the .git dir into my current working web dir and repeat. So that my web dir with history is all in git now.)

From my test, each step will take 10 minutes.

I am new to git. Plus is if anyone can tell me whether/how to also add a tag of date (if it is good for this.)

Is there a better way?

Answer 1

Rather than git add ., which will always add files, I recommend git add -A which will “find new files as well as staging modified content and removing files that are no longer in the working tree” (from the git docs).

I’d write a script that looks something like this:

#!/bin/bash
git init
GIT_DIR=$(pwd)
for dir in $(find . -maxdepth 1 -name web_backup_\* | sort); do
  pushd $dir
  git add -A
  git commit -m "Backup for $dir."
  git tag $dir
  popd
done