git-checkout-index(1) ===================== NAME ---- git-checkout-index - Copy files from the index to the working directory SYNOPSIS -------- [verse] 'git-checkout-index' [-u] [-q] [-a] [-f] [-n] [--prefix=] [--stage=] [--] ... DESCRIPTION ----------- Will copy all files listed from the index to the working directory (not overwriting existing files). OPTIONS ------- -u|--index:: update stat information for the checked out entries in the index file. -q|--quiet:: be quiet if files exist or are not in the index -f|--force:: forces overwrite of existing files -a|--all:: checks out all files in the index. Cannot be used together with explicit filenames. -n|--no-create:: Don't checkout new files, only refresh files already checked out. --prefix=:: When creating files, prepend (usually a directory including a trailing /) --stage=:: Instead of checking out unmerged entries, copy out the files from named stage. must be between 1 and 3. --:: Do not interpret any more arguments as options. The order of the flags used to matter, but not anymore. Just doing `git-checkout-index` does nothing. You probably meant `git-checkout-index -a`. And if you want to force it, you want `git-checkout-index -f -a`. Intuitiveness is not the goal here. Repeatability is. The reason for the "no arguments means no work" behavior is that from scripts you are supposed to be able to do: ---------------- $ find . -name '*.h' -print0 | xargs -0 git-checkout-index -f -- ---------------- which will force all existing `*.h` files to be replaced with their cached copies. If an empty command line implied "all", then this would force-refresh everything in the index, which was not the point. The `--` is just a good idea when you know the rest will be filenames; it will prevent problems with a filename of, for example, `-a`. Using `--` is probably a good policy in scripts. EXAMPLES -------- To update and refresh only the files already checked out:: + ---------------- $ git-checkout-index -n -f -a && git-update-index --ignore-missing --refresh ---------------- Using `git-checkout-index` to "export an entire tree":: The prefix ability basically makes it trivial to use `git-checkout-index` as an "export as tree" function. Just read the desired tree into the index, and do: + ---------------- $ git-checkout-index --prefix=git-export-dir/ -a ---------------- + `git-checkout-index` will "export" the index into the specified directory. + The final "/" is important. The exported name is literally just prefixed with the specified string. Contrast this with the following example. Export files with a prefix:: + ---------------- $ git-checkout-index --prefix=.merged- Makefile ---------------- + This will check out the currently cached copy of `Makefile` into the file `.merged-Makefile`. Author ------ Written by Linus Torvalds Documentation -------------- Documentation by David Greaves, Junio C Hamano and the git-list . GIT --- Part of the gitlink:git[7] suite