git-lock

Disable the ability to commit changes of a local file

$ git lock [path/to/file]

git-lock <file>

The git-lock command, though not a standard core Git command, is often found in helper scripts within Git workflows. It provides a basic mechanism for ensuring exclusive access to a file, preventing concurrent modifications. This is essential in scenarios where multiple processes might attempt to read or write to the same file simultaneously, leading to data corruption or inconsistencies. The locking mechanism typically involves creating a lockfile (e.g., a file with a .lock extension) and checking for its existence. If the lockfile exists, another process is already accessing the file, and the current process should wait or exit. If the lockfile doesn't exist, the current process creates it, signifying its exclusive access to the target file.

It's crucial to note that git-lock usually offers advisory locking, meaning it relies on cooperating processes to respect the lock. It doesn't provide mandatory locking enforced by the operating system. Therefore, processes that don't check for the lockfile can still bypass the locking mechanism. Properly designed scripts and workflows are required for reliable functionality. While not directly part of standard Git, it's a utility for creating safer and more reliable extensions to Git.

This is an advisory lock, relies on cooperating processes. Not a standard Git command, it is likely a helper script or user-defined command.

The most common implementation of git-lock checks for the existence of a file called `.lock`. If such a file exists, git-lock exits with an error code to indicate that the lock cannot be obtained. Otherwise, the lock file is created, and git-lock exits with code 0. A process that is about to change `` should check for the success of `git-lock ` before proceeding. After `` has been changed, it should remove `.lock`

Proper error handling is crucial when using git-lock. Scripts should always check the exit status of the git-lock command to ensure that the lock was successfully acquired. If the lock cannot be acquired, the script should retry after a delay, or exit gracefully with an informative error message. Also the lock file should be explicitly deleted by the process that creates it when the file is done being processed.

flock(1)