From time to time we are asked whether SmartGit supports sparse checkout? The answer is: it does once configured. Let’s assume you have a remote repository with two top-level directories:

/ /dir1 /dir2

To have a sparse clone of only directory dir1, initialize a new local repository:

$ mkdir sparse $ cd sparse $ git init

Enable sparse checkouts in .git/config by:

git config core.sparsecheckout true

Add

dir1/

to .git/info/sparse-checkout, open the repository in SmartGit and use Remote > Add to add your remote repository and finally Fetch and Checkout.

If you already have an existing local repository which you want to make sparse, enable the git config option and configure .git/info/sparse-checkout as above and finally re-read the repository tree using:

git read-tree -m -u HEAD

Now SmartGit will only show dir1.