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Checking out git repositories with filenames that are invalid on Windows

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Yury V. Zaytsev

26 Oct, 2015 08:39 PM

Hi folks,

I'm trying to set up AppVeyor CI for the Windows port of git-annex: https://github.com/joeyh/git-annex/ . Unfortunately, the canonical repository contains filenames with colons (":"), which are not allowed on Windows, and so Git for Windows ends up in a bad state after checkout: https://ci.appveyor.com/project/zaytsev/git-annex . However, git from Cygwin is able to checkout this repository just fine, presumably because the POSIX compatibility layer does suitable filename translation.

So, my question is as follows: is it somehow possible to tell AppVeyor that it shouldn't clone and checkout the repository, so that I could do it myself using the Cygwin version of git from the init section of appveyor.yml? Alternatively, is it possible to tell AppVeyor to use the Cygwin version of git instead of the one from Git for Windows?

Many thanks!

1. Support Staff 1 Posted by Feodor Fitsner on 26 Oct, 2015 08:46 PM

   

   Hi Yury,

   You may try at least two options here:

   1) Try using shallow clone: http://www.appveyor.com/docs/how-to/repository-shallow-clone - this way repo will be downloaded as a zip.

   2) Modify PATH variable to give cygwin git a priority:

   set PATH=C:\cygwin\bin;%PATH%
   

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2. 2 Posted by Yury V. Zaytsev on 26 Oct, 2015 08:54 PM

   

   Hi Feodor,

   Thanks for the hints!

   1) I don't think that shallow clones would be very useful in my case, even if they worked, because the build sequence needs a proper repository checkout.

   Of course, I can simply `rm -rf` the whole directory anyways, and put my own checkout commands in `init`, but this sounds like a waste, doesn't it?!

   2) Regarding PATH modification, could you please tell me where in `appveyor.yml` I should put this so that it has the effect on the git commands executed by AppVeyor itself?

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3. Support Staff 3 Posted by Feodor Fitsner on 26 Oct, 2015 08:59 PM

   

   Modify PATH in init:

   init:
   - set PATH=C:\cygwin\bin;%PATH%
   

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4. 4 Posted by Yury V. Zaytsev on 26 Oct, 2015 09:13 PM

   

   Oh wow, thank you very much, Feodor! Slowly (~5 min), but it did work. This resolves my problem... :-)

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5. Yury V. Zaytsev closed this discussion on 26 Oct, 2015 09:33 PM.