DVC: A GitHub Repo Manager

DVC (Done Very Clean) is a simple tool to assist in managing your locally-cloned GitHub repositories in one place. It functions very similarly to your favorite command line package managers such as npm, brew, or apt, but is meant to be much simpler.

$ dvc clone attaswift/bigint
...
$ dvc clone trekhleb/javascript-algorithms
...
$ dvc ls
attaswift/bigint
trekhleb/javascript-algorithms
$ dvc rm attaswift/bigint
Deleted cloned repo: /Users/Me/DVC_repos/attaswift/bigint
$ dvc ls
trekhleb/javascript-algorithms

Requirements

As far as I know, DVC only requires that git be installed on your machine, and that you have the latest version of Swift installed, so you can build the binary.

Environment Variables

Before getting to the exciting stuff, it is worth mentioning that DVC preferentially configures itself based on two shell environment variables:

• DVC_GIT: The absolute path to your git executable. If this isn't specified, DVC searches for a git executable by querying the system with which git. If this behavior is undesirable (or it is failing), be sure to set this variable.
• DVC_ROOT: The absolute path to the directory that you want DVC to operate in. If this variable is not set, DVC works in $HOME/DVC_repos. If this directory does not exist upon invocation of dvc (besides asking for help, version, or prefix), DVC will create the directory for you.

Be sure to configure these variables within your appropriate shell configuration file, such as ~/.bash_profile, ~/.bashrc, .zshrc, etc.

export DVC_GIT=/path/to/git
export DVC_ROOT=/path/to/directory

Installation

Installing the binary is fairly painless. First download the repository (a bit ironic, I know!)

$ git clone https://github.com/deus-x-mackina/dvc.git
...
$ cd dvc

Once inside the repository, ask Swift to build the package for you.

$ swift build -c release
# Creates a ./.build directory

Now the binary will be located within the ./.build directory. Copy the binary to a directory that is included in your shells $PATH.

# View the current PATH
$ echo $PATH
# Copy the binary to a directory in PATH
$ cp .build/release/dvc /path/to/directory

Personally, I prefer to put it in ~/bin. Now, you may need to restart your shell.

# Reload boot the shell
$ exec -l $SHELL

You should be good to go!

Completion Scripts

If typing out shell commands without autocomplete is a drag for you, there's good news! Binaries made with Apple's ArgumentParser library come bundled with a subcommand for doing just that.

# Replace <shell> with bash or zsh
$ dvc --generate-completion-script <shell> > /path/to/completion/_dvc

For example, I use ZSH with Oh My Zsh, so I run dvc --generate-completion-script zsh > ~/.oh-my-zsh/completions/_dvc.

It's important that you put the completion script in a file named _dvc. For more information about this command, see here.

Commands

dvc

$ dvc help
OVERVIEW: Manage cloned GitHub repos.

USAGE: dvc [--prefix] <subcommand>

OPTIONS:
  --prefix                Print the path of the directory that DVC manages.
  --version               Show the version.
  -h, --help              Show help information.

SUBCOMMANDS:
  clone                   Clone a repository.
  rm                      Remove a cloned repository.
  ls                      List the currently cloned repos.

  See 'dvc help <subcommand>' for detailed help.

dvc clone

$ dvc help clone
OVERVIEW: Clone a repository.

USAGE: dvc clone <repo>

ARGUMENTS:
  <repo>                  The repository to clone.
                          Can be a full URL: https://github.com/<account>/<repo>.git
                          or a shorthand: <account>/<repo>

OPTIONS:
  --prefix                Print the path of the directory that DVC manages.
  --version               Show the version.
  -h, --help              Show help information.

dvc ls

$ dvc help ls
OVERVIEW: List the currently cloned repos.

USAGE: dvc ls [--display <display>]

OPTIONS:
  --prefix                Print the path of the directory that DVC manages.
  --display <display>     Display repos as rows or columns. (default: rows)
  --version               Show the version.
  -h, --help              Show help information.

dvc rm

$ dvc help rm
OVERVIEW: Remove a cloned repository.

USAGE: dvc rm <repo> [--aggressive-clean]

ARGUMENTS:
  <repo>                  The repository to remove. Should be in the form <account>/<repo>

OPTIONS:
  --prefix                Print the path of the directory that DVC manages.
  --aggressive-clean      By default, DVC will remove an account directory if
                          it not longer contains anything after a repo removal.
                          However, this is blocked if the account directory
                          contains any files or subdirectories in it (whether
                          they are git repos or not). On MacOS systems, .DS_Store
                          files in the account directory may also cause this
                          behavior. Add this flag to remove the account directory
                          only if it doesn't contain any git repos, ignoring
                          other files and subdirectories.
  --version               Show the version.
  -h, --help              Show help information.

Tip: Changing into a DVC Repo

Suppose dvc ls returns something like the following:

$ dvc ls
foo/bar
someuser/somerepo

DVC can't directory change directories of your shell for you, but you can execute a quick workaround. To change into foo/bar simply execute:

$ cd $(dvc --prefix)/foo/bar
# You are now in $DVC_ROOT/foo/bar

Alternatively, this script can be pasted into your favorite shell profile file in order to offer this functionality.

Acknowledgements

As with most things that I have on GitHub, this program was meant to be a personal project, but feel free to use DVC (subject to the terms of the MIT license) if you find it useful, and also contribute if you like!

Todo

I need to add tests, though it's tricky to write unit tests for executables in Swift.