Installation

gem install clone_git_file

Description

;tldr

This gem allows you to replace these commands:

  1. mkdir -p ~/dev/author
  2. cd ~/dev/author
  3. git clone https://github.com/author/repo
  4. cd repo
  5. myeditor file.rb

with:

cgf https://github.com/author/repo/file.rb (assuming you setup the alias below)

Long version

This gem will clone the repository containing a file, then open that file in your chosen editor. If the repository already exists in the specified directory, any uncommitted changes will be lost (git reset HEAD --hard will be run). The repository will be pulled after resetting, to get the latest changes.

The editor that will be used is specified using the EDITOR environment variable, which allows you to easily override your editor only for this command.

Usage

At a minimum, you need to specify a target directory:

TARGET_DIRECTORY=~/dev clone_git_file https://github.com/brandoncc/clone_git_file/blob/master/README.md

That will clone this repository to ~/dev/clone_git_file then open README.md from the master branch.

If you want to override your default editor, just add EDITOR=myeditor to the beginning. For example:

EDITOR=mvim TARGET_DIRECTORY=~/dev clone_git_file https://github.com/brandoncc/clone_git_file/blob/master/README.md

Bonus

  • You can also supply the repo url or a repo directory url, and that directory will be opened by your editor

  • Setup an alias to make using the gem easy. For example, here is mine (zsh):

    alias cgf="TARGET_DIRECTORY=~/dev EDITOR=mvim clone_git_file $1"

Limitations

Github is the only service that is current compatible. I would like to add more services in the future.