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+git-pack-objects(1)
+===================
+
+NAME
+----
+git-pack-objects - Create a packed archive of objects
+
+
+SYNOPSIS
+--------
+[verse]
+'git-pack-objects' [-q] [--no-reuse-delta] [--delta-base-offset] [--non-empty]
+ [--local] [--incremental] [--window=N] [--depth=N] [--all-progress]
+ [--revs [--unpacked | --all]*] [--stdout | base-name] < object-list
+
+
+DESCRIPTION
+-----------
+Reads list of objects from the standard input, and writes a packed
+archive with specified base-name, or to the standard output.
+
+A packed archive is an efficient way to transfer set of objects
+between two repositories, and also is an archival format which
+is efficient to access. The packed archive format (.pack) is
+designed to be unpackable without having anything else, but for
+random access, accompanied with the pack index file (.idx).
+
+'git-unpack-objects' command can read the packed archive and
+expand the objects contained in the pack into "one-file
+one-object" format; this is typically done by the smart-pull
+commands when a pack is created on-the-fly for efficient network
+transport by their peers.
+
+Placing both in the pack/ subdirectory of $GIT_OBJECT_DIRECTORY (or
+any of the directories on $GIT_ALTERNATE_OBJECT_DIRECTORIES)
+enables git to read from such an archive.
+
+In a packed archive, an object is either stored as a compressed
+whole, or as a difference from some other object. The latter is
+often called a delta.
+
+
+OPTIONS
+-------
+base-name::
+ Write into a pair of files (.pack and .idx), using
+ <base-name> to determine the name of the created file.
+ When this option is used, the two files are written in
+ <base-name>-<SHA1>.{pack,idx} files. <SHA1> is a hash
+ of the sorted object names to make the resulting filename
+ based on the pack content, and written to the standard
+ output of the command.
+
+--stdout::
+ Write the pack contents (what would have been written to
+ .pack file) out to the standard output.
+
+--revs::
+ Read the revision arguments from the standard input, instead of
+ individual object names. The revision arguments are processed
+ the same way as gitlink:git-rev-list[1] with `--objects` flag
+ uses its `commit` arguments to build the list of objects it
+ outputs. The objects on the resulting list are packed.
+
+--unpacked::
+ This implies `--revs`. When processing the list of
+ revision arguments read from the standard input, limit
+ the objects packed to those that are not already packed.
+
+--all::
+ This implies `--revs`. In addition to the list of
+ revision arguments read from the standard input, pretend
+ as if all refs under `$GIT_DIR/refs` are specified to be
+ included.
+
+--window=[N], --depth=[N]::
+ These two options affect how the objects contained in
+ the pack are stored using delta compression. The
+ objects are first internally sorted by type, size and
+ optionally names and compared against the other objects
+ within --window to see if using delta compression saves
+ space. --depth limits the maximum delta depth; making
+ it too deep affects the performance on the unpacker
+ side, because delta data needs to be applied that many
+ times to get to the necessary object.
+ The default value for --window is 10 and --depth is 50.
+
+--window-memory=[N]::
+ This option provides an additional limit on top of `--window`;
+ the window size will dynamically scale down so as to not take
+ up more than N bytes in memory. This is useful in
+ repositories with a mix of large and small objects to not run
+ out of memory with a large window, but still be able to take
+ advantage of the large window for the smaller objects. The
+ size can be suffixed with "k", "m", or "g".
+ `--window-memory=0` makes memory usage unlimited, which is the
+ default.
+
+--max-pack-size=<n>::
+ Maximum size of each output packfile, expressed in MiB.
+ If specified, multiple packfiles may be created.
+ The default is unlimited.
+
+--incremental::
+ This flag causes an object already in a pack ignored
+ even if it appears in the standard input.
+
+--local::
+ This flag is similar to `--incremental`; instead of
+ ignoring all packed objects, it only ignores objects
+ that are packed and not in the local object store
+ (i.e. borrowed from an alternate).
+
+--non-empty::
+ Only create a packed archive if it would contain at
+ least one object.
+
+--progress::
+ Progress status is reported on the standard error stream
+ by default when it is attached to a terminal, unless -q
+ is specified. This flag forces progress status even if
+ the standard error stream is not directed to a terminal.
+
+--all-progress::
+ When --stdout is specified then progress report is
+ displayed during the object count and deltification phases
+ but inhibited during the write-out phase. The reason is
+ that in some cases the output stream is directly linked
+ to another command which may wish to display progress
+ status of its own as it processes incoming pack data.
+ This flag is like --progress except that it forces progress
+ report for the write-out phase as well even if --stdout is
+ used.
+
+-q::
+ This flag makes the command not to report its progress
+ on the standard error stream.
+
+--no-reuse-delta::
+ When creating a packed archive in a repository that
+ has existing packs, the command reuses existing deltas.
+ This sometimes results in a slightly suboptimal pack.
+ This flag tells the command not to reuse existing deltas
+ but compute them from scratch.
+
+--no-reuse-object::
+ This flag tells the command not to reuse existing object data at all,
+ including non deltified object, forcing recompression of everything.
+ This implies --no-reuse-delta. Useful only in the obscure case where
+ wholesale enforcement of a different compression level on the
+ packed data is desired.
+
+--compression=[N]::
+ Specifies compression level for newly-compressed data in the
+ generated pack. If not specified, pack compression level is
+ determined first by pack.compression, then by core.compression,
+ and defaults to -1, the zlib default, if neither is set.
+ Data copied from loose objects will be recompressed
+ if core.legacyheaders was true when they were created or if
+ the loose compression level (see core.loosecompression and
+ core.compression) is now a different value than the pack
+ compression level. Add --no-reuse-object if you want to force
+ a uniform compression level on all data no matter the source.
+
+--delta-base-offset::
+ A packed archive can express base object of a delta as
+ either 20-byte object name or as an offset in the
+ stream, but older version of git does not understand the
+ latter. By default, git-pack-objects only uses the
+ former format for better compatibility. This option
+ allows the command to use the latter format for
+ compactness. Depending on the average delta chain
+ length, this option typically shrinks the resulting
+ packfile by 3-5 per-cent.
+
+--index-version=<version>[,<offset>]::
+ This is intended to be used by the test suite only. It allows
+ to force the version for the generated pack index, and to force
+ 64-bit index entries on objects located above the given offset.
+
+
+Author
+------
+Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>
+
+Documentation
+-------------
+Documentation by Junio C Hamano
+
+See Also
+--------
+gitlink:git-rev-list[1]
+gitlink:git-repack[1]
+gitlink:git-prune-packed[1]
+
+GIT
+---
+Part of the gitlink:git[7] suite