git-annex/doc/todo/git_smudge_clean_interface_suboptiomal.mdwn

git-annex uses git's smudge/clean interface to implement v6 unlocked
files. However, the interface is suboptimal for git-annex's needs. While
git-annex works around most of the problems with the interface, it can't
avoid some consequences of this poor fit, and it has to do some surprising
things to make it work as well as it does.

First, how git's smudge/clean interface is meant to work: The smudge filter
is run on the content of files as stored in a repo before they are written to
the work tree, and can alter the content in arbitrary ways. The clean filter
reverses the smudge filter, so git can use it to get the content to store
in the repo. See gitattributes(5) for details.

It was originally used for minor textual changes (eg line ending
conversion), but it's general enough to be used to add large file support
to git. git-lfs uses it that way.

The first problem with the interface was that it ran a command once per
file. This was later fixed by extending it to support long-running filter
processes, which git-lfs uses.

A second problem with the interface, which affects git-lfs AFAIK, is that
git buffers the output of the smudge filter in memory before updating the
working tree. If the smudge filter emits a large file, git can use a lot of
memory. Of course, on modern computers this needs to be hundreds of
megabytes to be very noticable. git-lfs may tend to be used with
files not that large. git-annex avoids this problem by not using the smudge
filter in the usual way, as described below.

A third problem with the interface is that piping large file contents
between git and filters is innefficient. Seems this must affect git-lfs
too, but perhaps it's used on less enourmous data sets than git-annex.
To avoid the problem, git-annex relies on a not very well documented trick: The
clean filter is fed a possibly large file on stdin, but when it closes the FD
without reading. git gets a SIGPIPE and stops reading and sending the
file. Instead of reading from stdin, git-annex abuses the fact that git
provides the clean filter with the work tree filename, and reads and cleans
the file itself, more efficiently. But, this trick only works when the
long-running filter process interface is not used, so git-annex can't use
it.

git-lfs differs from git-annex in that all the large files in the
repository are usually present in the working tree; it doesn't have a way
to drop content that is not wanted locally while keeping other content
locally available, as git-annex does. And so it does not need to be able to
get content like git-annex can do either. It also differs in that it uses a
central server, which is trusted to retain content, so it doesn't try to
avoid losing the local copy, which could be the only copy, as git-annex
does. (All AFAIK; have not looked at git-lfs recently.) 

Those properties of git-lfs make it fit fairly well into the smudge/clean
interface. Conversely, the different properties of git-annex make it a poor
fit. 

* git-annex needs to be able to update the working tree itself,
  to make large file content available or not available. But this would cause
  git to think the file is modified. 
  
  The way git-annex works around this is to run git update-index on files
  after updating them. Git then runs the clean filter, and the clean filter
  tells git there's not been any real modification of the file.

* git-annex needs to hard link from its object store to a work tree
  file, to avoid keeping two copies of the file on disk while preventing
  a rm or git checkout from deleting the only local copy. But the smudge
  interface does not provide a way to update the worktree itself.

  So, git-annex's smudge filter does not actually provide the large file
  content. It just echos back the file as checked into git, and
  remembers that git wanted to check out that file.
  git-annex installs post-checkout, post-merge, and pre-commit
  hooks, which update the working tree files to make content from
  git-annex available. Of course, that means git sees modifications to the
  working tree, so git-annex then has to run git update-index on the files,
  which runs the clean filter, as described above.
  
  (Not emitting large files from the smudge filter also avoids the problem with git
  leaking memory described earlier.)

And here's the consequences of git-annex's workarounds:

* It doesn't use the long-running filter process interface, so `git add`
  of a lot of files runs the clean filter once per file, which is slower than it
  could be. Using `git-annex add` avoids this problem.

* After a git-annex get/drop or a git checkout or pull that affects a lot
  of files, the clean filter gets run once per file, which is again, slower
  than ideal.

* In a rare situation, git-annex would like to get git to run the clean
  filter, but it cannot because git has the index locked. So, git-annex has
  to print an ugly warning message saying that git status will show
  modififcations to files that are not really modified, and giving a command to
  fix the git status display.

* git does not run any hook after a `git stash` or `git reset --hard`,
  or `git cherry-pick`, so after these operations, annexed files remain unpopulated
  until the user runs `git annex fix`.

The best fix would be to improve git's smudge/clean interface:

* Add hooks run after every work tree update or after `git stash` and
  `git reset --hard`

* Avoid buffering smudge filter output in memory.

* Allow smudge filter to modify the work tree itself.
  (I developed a patch series for this in 2016, but it didn't land.
  --[[Joey]])

* Allow clean filter to read work tree files itself, to avoid overhead of
  sending huge files through a pipe.

[[!tag confirmed]]