unrepo is a template repository scaffolding tool that creates copies of git repositories with support for private repos. It taps into the compressed tarball of a repository to quickly pull down a copy without all that extra git cruft.

A fork of rdmurphy/create-clone

Key features

• 🎏 Supports GitHub repos, GitHub gists, GitLab and Bitbucket
• 💡 Understands GitHub shorthand (user/my-cool-template) for referring to repositories
• 🔐 With proper credentials in place can clone private repositories on GitHub, GitLab and Bitbucket
• 🌳 Support subdirectory and single file

Table of contents

• Setup
• Usage
  • GitHub
  • GitLab
  • Bitbucket
  • Gist
• Private repos
  • GitHub
  • GitLab
  • Bitbucket
• What makes this different from degit?
• License

Setup

unrepo requires at least Node 10 to run.

This library expects to be used in a global context and makes the most sense when installed globally.

npm install --global unrepo
# or
yarn global add unrepo

This also means it works great when paired with npx.

npx unrepo <repository> <dest>

Usage

unrepo works any git host URLs that hosted-git-info supports. By default the copy of the repository is output into your current working directory. A path to a different directory can be provided as the second parameter and will be created if necessary.

# The contents of the repository will be copied into the current directory
unrepo user/repository

# The contents of the repository will be copied into provided directory (and created if necessary)
unrepo user/repository my-new-project

By default unrepo will stop and not touch a target directory that already contains files, but this can be overriden with --force.

# I already have something in the "my-old-project" directory, but I don't care
unrepo user/repository my-old-project --force

GitHub

# shortcuts only available to GitHub
unrepo user/repository
unrepo user/repository#branch

unrepo github:user/repository
unrepo github:user/repository.git
unrepo github:user/repository#branch
unrepo github:user/repository.git#branch

unrepo github:user/repository//subdirectory/
unrepo github:user/repository.git//subdirectory/
unrepo github:user/repository#branch//subdirectory/
unrepo github:user/repository.git#branch//subdirectory/

# github.com and www.github.com are both supported
unrepo https://github.com/user/repository
unrepo https://github.com/user/repository.git
unrepo https://github.com/user/repository#branch
unrepo https://github.com/user/repository.git#branch
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository.git
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository#branch
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository.git#branch

GitLab

unrepo gitlab:user/repository
unrepo gitlab:user/repository.git
unrepo gitlab:user/repository#branch
unrepo gitlab:user/repository.git#branch

unrepo gitlab:user/repository//subdirectory/
unrepo gitlab:user/repository.git//subdirectory/
unrepo gitlab:user/repository#branch//subdirectory/
unrepo gitlab:user/repository.git#branch//subdirectory/

# gitlab.com and www.gitlab.com are both supported
unrepo https://gitlab.com/user/repository
unrepo https://gitlab.com/user/repository.git
unrepo https://gitlab.com/user/repository#branch
unrepo https://gitlab.com/user/repository.git#branch
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository.git
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository#branch
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository.git#branch

Bitbucket

unrepo bitbucket:user/repository
unrepo bitbucket:user/repository.git
unrepo bitbucket:user/repository#branch
unrepo bitbucket:user/repository.git#branch

unrepo bitbucket:user/repository//subdirectory/
unrepo bitbucket:user/repository.git//subdirectory/
unrepo bitbucket:user/repository#branch//subdirectory/
unrepo bitbucket:user/repository.git#branch//subdirectory/

# bitbucket.org and www.bitbucket.org are both supported
unrepo https://bitbucket.org/user/repository
unrepo https://bitbucket.org/user/repository.git
unrepo https://bitbucket.org/user/repository#branch
unrepo https://bitbucket.org/user/repository.git#branch
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository.git
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository#branch
unrepo [email protected]:user/repository.git#branch

Gist

unrepo gist:user/hash
unrepo gist:user/hash.git
unrepo gist:user/hash#branch
unrepo gist:user/hash.git#branch

unrepo [email protected]:hash.git
unrepo git+https://gist.github.com:hash.git
unrepo git+https://gist.github.com:hash.git
unrepo https://gist.github.com/user/hash
unrepo https://gist.github.com/user/hash.git
unrepo https://gist.github.com/user/hash#branch
unrepo https://gist.github.com/user/hash.git#branch
unrepo [email protected]:user/hash
unrepo [email protected]:user/hash.git
unrepo [email protected]:user/hash#branch
unrepo [email protected]:user/hash.git#branch

Private repos

GitHub, GitLab and Bitbucket all have varying methods for authenticating against their services, so each one needs slightly different permissions and keys.

Fun fact — Private GitHub gists are already supported without any additional authentication because they're only "private" as long as no one else has the URL. This is a documented feature!

GitHub

unrepo requires a GitHub personal access token with read access for repositories and/or gists. Once you have this token, it needs to be available in your environment at GITHUB_TOKEN.

In your .bashrc/.zshrc/preferred shell config:

export GITHUB_TOKEN=<personal-access-token>

unrepo will check for this environment variable when attempting to clone a GitHub repository or gist and include it as an authorization header in the request. unrepo will be able to clone any private GitHub repo your account can access.

GitLab

GitLab also has personal access tokens, but because access to the archive of a private repository is only available via the GitLab API, your token needs to be given the scope of api access, not read_repository. Once you have this token, it needs to be available in your environment at GITLAB_TOKEN.

In your .bashrc/.zshrc/preferred shell config:

export GITLAB_TOKEN=<personal-access-token>

unrepo will check for this environment variable when attempting to clone a GitLab repository and include it as an authorization header in the request. unrepo will be able to clone any private GitLab repo your account can access.

Bitbucket

This is the funky one. Bitbucket does not have the equivalent of a personal access token, so we need to use what it calls an app password. The only permission your app password needs is Repositories -> Read. However, because we are using what's essentially a single-purpose password, we also need to include your Bitbucket username as part of the request. To accomplish this, we need to set up two environmental variables: BITBUCKET_USER for your username, and BITBUCKET_TOKEN for your app password.

In your .bashrc/.zshrc/preferred shell config:

export BITBUCKET_USER=<your-bitbucket-username>
export BITBUCKET_TOKEN=<app-password>

unrepo will check for this environment variable when attempting to clone a Bitbucket repository and include it as the user and password of the request. unrepo will be able to clone any private Bitbucket repo your account can access.

What makes this different from degit?

Honestly? Not a whole lot. This was mostly me wanting to be able to do something cool like npm init clone <repo>/yarn create clone <repo>.

The most notable difference is unrepo does not have a caching layer like degit does. In practice I've not found that to be a major issue, but it may be a big deal for some folks! degit also has a cool actions framework layered on top.

License

MIT