pack-objects: support reachability bitmaps with `--path-walk`

When 'pack-objects' is invoked with '--path-walk', it prevents us from using reachability bitmaps. This behavior dates back to 70664d2865c (pack-objects: add --path-walk option, 2025-05-16), which included a comment in the relevant portion of the command-line arguments handling that read as follows: /* * We must disable the bitmaps because we are removing * the --objects / --objects-edge[-aggressive] options. */ In fb2c309b7d3 (pack-objects: pass --objects with --path-walk, 2026-05-02), path-walk learned to pass '--objects' again, but still kept bitmap traversal disabled. That leaves two useful cases unsupported: * A path-walk repack that writes bitmaps does not give the bitmap selector any commits, because path-walk reveals commits through `add_objects_by_path()` rather than through `show_commit()`, where `index_commit_for_bitmap()` is normally called. * An invocation like "git pack-objects --use-bitmap-index --path-walk" never tries an existing bitmap, even when one is available and could answer the request. Fortunately for us, neither restriction is required. * On the writing side: teach the path-walk object callback to call `index_commit_for_bitmap()` for commits that it adds to the pack. That gives the bitmap selector the commit candidates it would have seen from the regular traversal. * For bitmap reading, keep passing '--objects' to the internal rev_list machinery, but stop clearing `use_bitmap_index`. If an existing bitmap can answer the request, use it; otherwise fall back to path-walk's own enumeration. As a result, we can see significantly reduced pack generation times from p5311 (with our `GIT_PERF_REPO` set to a recent clone of the fluentui repository) before this commit: Test HEAD^ HEAD ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5311.40: server (1 days, --path-walk) 1.43(1.39+0.04) 0.01(0.01+0.00) -99.3% 5311.41: size (1 days, --path-walk) 139.6K 139.7K +0.0% 5311.42: client (1 days, --path-walk) 0.02(0.02+0.00) 0.02(0.02+0.00) +0.0% 5311.44: server (2 days, --path-walk) 1.43(1.39+0.04) 0.01(0.00+0.00) -99.3% 5311.45: size (2 days, --path-walk) 139.6K 139.7K +0.0% 5311.46: client (2 days, --path-walk) 0.02(0.02+0.00) 0.02(0.02+0.00) +0.0% 5311.48: server (4 days, --path-walk) 1.44(1.39+0.04) 0.01(0.01+0.00) -99.3% 5311.49: size (4 days, --path-walk) 238.1K 238.1K +0.0% 5311.50: client (4 days, --path-walk) 0.03(0.03+0.00) 0.03(0.03+0.00) +0.0% 5311.52: server (8 days, --path-walk) 1.43(1.39+0.03) 0.01(0.00+0.00) -99.3% 5311.53: size (8 days, --path-walk) 344.9K 344.9K +0.0% 5311.54: client (8 days, --path-walk) 0.07(0.07+0.00) 0.07(0.08+0.00) +0.0% 5311.56: server (16 days, --path-walk) 1.47(1.44+0.03) 0.10(0.08+0.01) -93.2% 5311.57: size (16 days, --path-walk) 844.0K 844.0K +0.0% 5311.58: client (16 days, --path-walk) 0.09(0.09+0.00) 0.09(0.09+0.00) +0.0% 5311.60: server (32 days, --path-walk) 1.52(1.50+0.05) 0.14(0.15+0.02) -90.8% 5311.61: size (32 days, --path-walk) 4.2M 4.2M +0.1% 5311.62: client (32 days, --path-walk) 0.34(0.48+0.02) 0.34(0.45+0.05) +0.0% 5311.64: server (64 days, --path-walk) 1.55(1.52+0.06) 0.15(0.15+0.04) -90.3% 5311.65: size (64 days, --path-walk) 6.4M 6.4M -0.0% 5311.66: client (64 days, --path-walk) 0.51(0.79+0.05) 0.51(0.80+0.06) +0.0% 5311.68: server (128 days, --path-walk) 1.59(1.57+0.06) 0.16(0.21+0.01) -89.9% 5311.69: size (128 days, --path-walk) 8.4M 8.4M -0.0% 5311.70: client (128 days, --path-walk) 0.72(1.44+0.08) 0.71(1.47+0.09) -1.4% We get the same size of output pack, but this commit allows us to do so in a significantly shorter amount of time. Intuitively, we're generating the same pack (hence the unchanged 'test_size' output from run to run), but varying how we get there. Before this commit, pack-objects prefers '--path-walk' to '--use-bitmap-index', so we generate the output pack by performing a normal '--path-walk' traversal. With this commit, we are operating over a *repacked* state (that itself was done with a '--path-walk' traversal), but are able to perform pack-reuse on that repacked state via bitmaps. When comparing the size of the repacked pack with/without '--path-walk' on the previous commit versus this one, we see that (a) the repacked size improves significantly with '--path-walk', and that (b) writing bitmaps during repacking does not regress this improvement: Test HEAD^ HEAD ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5311.3: size of bitmapped pack 558.4M 558.5M +0.0% 5311.38: size of bitmapped pack (--path-walk) 164.4M 164.4M +0.0% (Note that to observe an improvement here, we must repack with '-F' in order to avoid reusing non-'--path-walk' deltas, which would otherwise skew our results.) There is one wrinkle when it comes to '--boundary', which we must not pass into the bitmap walk in the presence of both '--path-walk' and '--use-bitmap-index'. Path-walk needs boundary commits when it performs its own traversal, in order to discover bases for thin packs, but the bitmap traversal does not expect this. Work around this by setting `revs->boundary` as late as possible within the '--path-walk' traversal, after any bitmap attempt has either succeeded or declined to answer the request. Signed-off-by: Taylor Blau <me@ttaylorr.com> Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>

Taylor Blau committed Jun 21, 2026 at 19:03 UTC 0a374511064bad27f707cb9f03448fb8aa25791f
4 files changed +70 -8
Documentation/git-pack-objects.adoc
+4 -2
@@ -402,8 +402,10 @@ will be automatically changed to version `1`.
402 of filenames that cause collisions in Git's default name-hash
403 algorithm.
404 +
405 -Incompatible with `--delta-islands`. The `--use-bitmap-index` option is
406 -ignored in the presence of `--path-walk`. The `--path-walk` option
405 +Incompatible with `--delta-islands`. When `--use-bitmap-index` is
406 +specified with `--path-walk`, a successful bitmap traversal is used for
407 +object enumeration, with path-walk remaining as the fallback traversal
408 +when the bitmap cannot satisfy the request. The `--path-walk` option
409 supports the `--filter=<spec>` forms `blob:none`, `blob:limit=<n>`,
410 `tree:0`, `object:type=<type>`, and `sparse:<oid>`. These supported filter
411 types can be combined with the `combine:<spec>+<spec>` form.
builtin/pack-objects.c
+16 -2
@@ -4742,6 +4742,15 @@ static int add_objects_by_path(const char *path,
4742 continue;
4743
4744 add_object_entry(oid, type, path, exclude);
4745 +
4746 + if (type == OBJ_COMMIT && write_bitmap_index) {
4747 + struct commit *commit;
4748 +
4749 + commit = lookup_commit(the_repository, oid);
4750 + if (!commit)
4751 + die(_("could not find commit %s"), oid_to_hex(oid));
4752 + index_commit_for_bitmap(commit);
4753 + }
4754 }
4755
4756 oe_end = to_pack.nr_objects;
@@ -4774,6 +4783,13 @@ static int get_object_list_path_walk(struct rev_info *revs)
4783 info.path_fn = add_objects_by_path;
4784 info.path_fn_data = &processed;
4785
4786 + /*
4787 + * Path-walk needs boundary commits to discover thin-pack bases, but
4788 + * bitmap traversal does not understand the boundary state. Set it
4789 + * here so any prior bitmap attempt sees the usual non-boundary walk.
4790 + */
4791 + revs->boundary = 1;
4792 +
4793 /*
4794 * Allow the --[no-]sparse option to be interesting here, if only
4795 * for testing purposes. Paths with no interesting objects will not
@@ -5205,9 +5221,7 @@ int cmd_pack_objects(int argc,
5221 }
5222 }
5223 if (path_walk) {
5208 - strvec_push(&rp, "--boundary");
5224 strvec_push(&rp, "--objects");
5210 - use_bitmap_index = 0;
5225 } else if (thin) {
5226 use_internal_rev_list = 1;
5227 strvec_push(&rp, shallow
t/perf/p5311-pack-bitmaps-fetch.sh
+14 -4
@@ -4,15 +4,22 @@ test_description='performance of fetches from bitmapped packs'
4 . ./perf-lib.sh
5
6 test_fetch_bitmaps () {
7 + argv=$1
8 + export argv
9 +
10 test_expect_success 'setup test directory' '
11 rm -fr * .git
12 '
13
14 test_perf_default_repo
15
13 - test_expect_success 'create bitmapped server repo' '
16 + test_expect_success "create bitmapped server repo ${argv:+($argv)}" '
17 git config pack.writebitmaps true &&
15 - git repack -ad
18 + git repack -adF $argv
19 + '
20 +
21 + test_size "size of bitmapped pack ${argv:+($argv)}" '
22 + test_file_size .git/objects/pack/pack-*.pack
23 '
24
25 # simulate a fetch from a repository that last fetched N days ago, for
@@ -20,7 +27,7 @@ test_fetch_bitmaps () {
27 # and assume the first entry in the chain that is N days older than the current
28 # HEAD is where the HEAD would have been then.
29 for days in 1 2 4 8 16 32 64 128; do
23 - title=$(printf '%10s' "($days days)")
30 + title=$(printf '%10s' "($days days${argv:+, $argv})")
31 test_expect_success "setup revs from $days days ago" '
32 now=$(git log -1 --format=%ct HEAD) &&
33 then=$(($now - ($days * 86400))) &&
@@ -47,6 +54,9 @@ test_fetch_bitmaps () {
54 done
55 }
56
50 -test_fetch_bitmaps
57 +for argv in '' --path-walk
58 +do
59 + test_fetch_bitmaps $argv || return 1
60 +done
61
62 test_done
t/t5310-pack-bitmaps.sh
+36
@@ -577,6 +577,42 @@ test_bitmap_cases
577
578 sane_unset GIT_TEST_PACK_USE_BITMAP_BOUNDARY_TRAVERSAL
579
580 +test_expect_success 'path-walk repack can write and use bitmap indexes' '
581 + test_when_finished "rm -rf path-walk-bitmap" &&
582 + git init path-walk-bitmap &&
583 + (
584 + cd path-walk-bitmap &&
585 + test_commit first &&
586 + test_commit second &&
587 + test_commit third &&
588 +
589 + git repack -a -d -b --path-walk &&
590 + git rev-list --test-bitmap --use-bitmap-index HEAD &&
591 +
592 + git rev-parse HEAD >in &&
593 +
594 + git rev-list --objects --no-object-names HEAD >expect.raw &&
595 + sort expect.raw >expect &&
596 +
597 + for reuse in true false
598 + do
599 + : >trace.txt &&
600 +
601 + GIT_TRACE2_EVENT="$(pwd)/trace.txt" \
602 + git -c pack.allowPackReuse=$reuse pack-objects \
603 + --stdout --revs --path-walk --use-bitmap-index \
604 + <in >out.pack &&
605 + test_grep "\"category\":\"bitmap\",\"key\":\"bitmap/hits\"" trace.txt &&
606 +
607 + git index-pack out.pack &&
608 +
609 + list_packed_objects out.idx >actual.raw &&
610 + sort actual.raw >actual &&
611 + test_cmp expect actual || return 1
612 + done
613 + )
614 +'
615 +
616 test_expect_success 'incremental repack fails when bitmaps are requested' '
617 test_commit more-1 &&
618 test_must_fail git repack -d 2>err &&