Re: Org + git branches for derived files

[Mark Barton]

Ken,

You could consider using git-lfs, Large File Support. There is some setup and 
then you can say track *.pdf and that will tell git to track the binary file in 
a more efficient way. I use this mailing for csv files that I want to have a 
snapshot version of with the Jupyter notebook that used them. Once you are 
tracking the files with git-lfs, they will be tracked with the normal git 
commits.

I agree that the best practice is not to commit these types of files, but 
sometimes it is handy to. By committing the PDF files to the repo, I can use 
Working Copy, a git client, on my iPad to quickly reference a document. Since 
the iPad cannot run Emacs, I am unable to regenerate the PDF from there.

Mark

> On Aug 13, 2021, at 11:40 AM, Ken Mankoff <mankoff@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Hello,
> 
> I think this might be more of a git question than an Org question, but I 
> imagine I might find the answer here and that it might be useful to others, 
> so I ask here.
> 
> I'd like to keep derivative products (the LaTeX output, the final PDF, etc.) 
> available in Git, but not commit those changes each time I change the Org 
> file. Perhaps git-annex as appropriate for this, but seems over-kill.
> 
> Is there some way to mostly-seamlessly commit the LaTeX and/or PDF and/or 
> other files to their own git branches but in a way that overwrites the 
> history of that branch, so that a small Org file that generates a big binary 
> PDF does not pollute the git tree?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
>  -k.
>