git-lad: a lean CLI for DataLad operations

Hatch project

This project is in its infancy. It aims to provide a modern, alternative command line interface (CLI) for DataLad operations. Key features and goals:

• clean, standard CLI (implemented with click, or rather rich-click
• lean code with few dependencies (implementations of operations are provided by datalad-core, with low-level tooling coming from datasalad
• close(r) alignment with Git/git-annex conventions and terminology, while retaining compatibility with any DataLad dataset
• sensible speed across all platforms
• homogeneous handling of Git repositories with or without an annex (as much as possible), and streamlined work with sub-modules (like DataLad)

Installation

Install git-lad with uv by running:

uv tool install git+https://hub.datalad.org/datalad/git-lad.git

This provides an immediately usable installation in a user space virtual environment. git-annex is automatically installed as a dependency in a matching version as part of the virtual environment.

Features

At the moment, the following features/operations are implemented:

• clone: create a repository clone and ready any annex with support for bare clones, specific-branches, shallow clones, and private annexes.
• create: create a new dataset, also bare, or in git-annex's private mode
• get: obtain missing content in a worktree, across submodule boundaries, as lean as possible by default

Contributing

Contributions to this library are welcome! Please see the contributing guidelines for details on scope and style of potential contributions.