Run git gc in the repository periodically

[corsac-s]

Hi,
I'm using radicale with the filesystem backend stored in a git repository. It works fine, but the repository slowly fills the filesystem with objects. I usually can save space by running git gc every once in a while, but it would be way easier if radicale would do it by itself.
It's actually painful to run git gc wheen there's no space left on the device.

[mookie-]

@corsac-s I think it's hard to do that with radicale as the git command are just executed as a hook.
My proposal would be to create a cronjob which runs this regulary like this:

4 2 1 * * radicale git --git-dir /path/to/radicale/git/.git gc

[corsac-s]

Unfortunately in my case that doesn't really work, my radicale instance runs in a container without cron, but I get your point.

[corsac-s]

But systemd runs so systemd timers work, actually

[mookie-]

That's a bit of a workaround but you could also add the gc to the hook but only run it if the last run was more than 1 month ago:

# UNTESTED pseudocode
old_gc=$(cat /tmp/gitgctimestamp); now=$(date +%s); diff=$((${now}-${old_gc})); if [ $diff -gt 43200 ]; then git --git dir /path/to/radicale/git/.git gc; echo $now > /tmp/gitgctimestamp; fi