Python way to clone a git repository

Is there a Python way without using a subprocess to clone a git repository? I'm up for using any sort of modules you recommend.

Solution 1:

Using GitPython will give you a good python interface to Git.

For example, after installing it (pip install gitpython), for cloning a new repository you can use clone_from function:

from git import Repo

Repo.clone_from(git_url, repo_dir)

See the GitPython Tutorial for examples on using the Repo object.

Note: GitPython requires git being installed on the system, and accessible via system's PATH.

Solution 2:

There is GitPython. Haven’t heard of it before and internally, it relies on having the git executables somewhere; additionally, they might have plenty of bugs. But it could be worth a try.

How to clone:

import git
git.Git("/your/directory/to/clone").clone("git://gitorious.org/git-python/mainline.git")

(It’s not nice and I don’t know if it is the supported way to do it, but it worked.)