Git source clones all history
Metadata
Current evaluation
Fixed by merged PR canonical/snapcraft#248 (commit 6ebd8e68d, merge 321b13277): Git sources now use a depth-1 shallow clone instead of fetching full history. Maintainer kyrofa linked the PR as the fix for LP #1536696.
Resolution: closed resolved
Reason: Commit 6ebd8e68d "Git source: Make a shallow clone." was merged via PR #248 (merge commit 321b13277, branch feature/1536696/git_clones_all_history), and kyrofa commented linking that PR as the fix. Later work made the depth configurable via source-depth (#814/#829), but the default shallow clone landed here.
Evaluated by: mr-cal-bot
No scores available.
Issue body
When specifying the `source` of a part to be a Git repository, Snapcraft clones the entire branch/tag's history, which can potentially be massive. There's really no reason to do this-- Snapcraft only needs the most recent commit.
Evaluation history
| Date | Model | Scores | Action | Summary |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| stealth/space-bunny-alpha | — | closed resolved | Fixed by merged PR canonical/snapcraft#248 (commit 6ebd8e68d, merge 321b13277): Git sources now use a depth-1 shallow clone instead of fetching full history. Maintainer kyrofa linked the PR as the fix for LP #1536696. | |
| stealth/space-bunny-alpha | — | closed resolved | Fixed by merged PR canonical/snapcraft#248 (commit 6ebd8e68d, merge 321b13277): git source now performs depth-1 shallow clones instead of fetching full history. Maintainer linked the PR as the fix (Launchpad bug #1536696). | |
| stealth/space-bunny-alpha | — | closed resolved | Fixed by canonical/snapcraft#248 (commit 6ebd8e68d), making Git source pulls use depth-1 shallow clones instead of downloading entire branch or tag histories. | |
| qwen/qwen3.6-35b-a3b | — | — | Closed without resolution. Likely abandoned or superseded by a later update, as no comments or fix details were recorded. | |
| qwen/qwen3.6-35b-a3b | — | — | Closed without implementation. The report that Snapcraft unnecessarily clones full Git history instead of fetching only the latest commit was abandoned due to prolonged inactivity. | |
| qwen/qwen3.6-35b-a3b | — | — | Closed without resolution. The request to optimize Snapcraft Git source cloning to fetch only the latest commit was abandoned due to lack of discussion. | |
| qwen3.6-35b-a3b-mtp-q6 | — | — | Closed without resolution. The unnecessary full Git history cloning behavior was abandoned or superseded by updated source handling. No fix or merge was implemented. |
Update history
| Date | Change |
|---|---|
| created |
Related work
-
Likely Fixed By:
canonical/snapcraft#248
(confidence 98%)
Merged PR that changed Git source handling to a depth-1 shallow clone; commit 6ebd8e68d, merge 321b13277, branch named after this bug.
-
Related To:
snapcraft#814
(confidence 65%)
Later made source-depth a parameter and opt-in, building on the shallow-clone behaviour introduced by #248.
Related issues
| Issue | Project | State | Summary | Similarity |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| #248 Git source: Make a shallow clone. | snapcraft | merged | Merged #248 (commit 6ebd8e68d; merge 321b13277), changing Git sources from full clones to depth-1 shallow clones and resolving LP #1536696. | |
| #1617783 Git clone with --depth=1 loses the tags | snapcraft (launchpad) | closed | Fixed by merged PR snapcore/snapcraft#814 (commit 190463c3c): Git clones became full-depth by default, with source-depth available as an explicit opt-in. | |
| #250 Backport to 1.x: Git source: Make a shallow clone. | snapcraft | merged | Merged PR #250 backported #248 to 1.x, making Git sources use shallow clones instead of downloading full repository history. | |
| #249 Git source: Support submodules. | snapcraft | merged | Merged canonical/snapcraft#249 via 1984cb339, adding recursive Git cloning and submodule updates on pull to resolve LP #1536698. | |
| #1476 fix(git-source): only shallow fetch if a source-depth is provided | craft-parts | merged | Merged as commit f1e2c927 (#1476): git-source now shallow-clones only when a non-zero source-depth is set, so full-hash source-commit no longer forces a shallow fetch. Released in craft-parts 2.28.1 and merged back via #1481. | |
| #1378 fix: shallow clone with source-commit if possible | craft-parts | merged | Merged PR #1378 as ae26318e: Git pulls now prefer a shallow fetch for source-commit when possible, with deep-fetch fallback, fixing #1360. |