Multiple Remote Repositories with Git

The Problem

Sometimes, we want to push update of our projects to multiple repositories, in different SCM. In this post, I am sharing one of the ways to do that.

Check your remote repository info. In this example I have a project pushed to Github:

$ git remote -v show
origin  https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git (fetch)
origin  https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git (push)

If you check your git configuration (PROJECT_NAME/.git/config), you will see:

$ git remote -v show
[core]
        repositoryformatversion = 0
        filemode = true
        bare = false
        logallrefupdates = true
[remote "origin"]
        url = https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git
        fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
[branch "dev"]
        remote = origin
        merge = refs/heads/dev
[http]
        sslverify = false

Now suppose you want to add a remote git repository on your Bitbucket project:

$ git remote set-url origin --add https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git

The Solution

To be able to do controlled Git workflow (e.g. just pull from Github remote or just push to Bitbucket remote), we add remote repository information using git remote:

$ git remote add bitbucket https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git

$ git remote add github https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git

Now our project’s Git configuration contains the information of the new repositories just added:

[core]
        repositoryformatversion = 0
        filemode = true
        bare = false
        logallrefupdates = true
[remote "origin"]
        url = https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git
        fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
        url = https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git
[branch "dev"]
        remote = origin
        merge = refs/heads/dev
[http]
        sslverify = false
[remote "bitbucket"]
        url = https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git
        fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/bitbucket/*
[remote "github"]
        url = https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git
        fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/github/*

In the sequence of “origin” block, Github remote takes precedence over the Bitbucket one; If you run git pull, it will still pull from only Github. If you want to make Bitbucket as the first source, you can just rearrange the sequence of “url” :

$ git remote -v
bitbucket       https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git (fetch)
bitbucket       https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git (push)
github  https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git (fetch)
github  https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git (push)
origin  https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git (fetch)
origin  https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git (push)
origin  https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git (push)

If you want to push your updates to the Bitbucket remote, you can run git push -u bitbucket <branch_name>:

$ git push -u bitbucket master
Username for 'https://<bitbucket_url>': <bitbucket_username>
Password for 'https://<bitbucket_username>@<domain>@<bitbucket_url>':
Enumerating objects: 32, done.
Counting objects: 100% (32/32), done.
Delta compression using up to 8 threads
Compressing objects: 100% (26/26), done.
Writing objects: 100% (32/32), 12.85 KiB | 4.28 MiB/s, done.
Total 32 (delta 1), reused 0 (delta 0)

You can do the same with your Github target:

$ git push -u github master
Username for 'https://github.com': GandhiNN
Password for 'https://GandhiNN@github.com':
Enumerating objects: 32, done.
Counting objects: 100% (32/32), done.
Delta compression using up to 8 threads
Compressing objects: 100% (26/26), done.
Writing objects: 100% (32/32), 12.85 KiB | 4.28 MiB/s, done.
Total 32 (delta 1), reused 0 (delta 0)
remote: Resolving deltas: 100% (1/1), done.

Let’s say that you want to set Bitbucket as the default remote for your git push / git pull activities, you need to add the Bitbucket URL as the remote “origin”:

$ git remote add origin https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git

$ git remote -v
bitbucket       https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git (fetch)
bitbucket       https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git (push)
github  https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git (fetch)
github  https://github.com/GandhiNN/iot-vernemq-ktig-stack.git (push)
origin  https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git (fetch)
origin  https://<bitbucket_url>/scm/<bitbucket_project_name>/iot-vernemq-kafka-poc-stack.git (push)

Notes

To skip SSL verification in your git workflow on your project you can use:

$ git config --local http.sslverify false

To save credentials used by your git workflow on your project you can use:

$ git config --local credential.helper store