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Rewritten History

Danger

On October 15, 2018, a lighter version of the libigl repository has been pushed to the master branch. This new version has its history rewritten, which does invalidate all commit SHA1 numbers pointing to previous versions of libigl. See the full list of changes in the changelog.

Why Are We Doing This?

libigl was always intended as lightweight library. Over the year, the size of the git repository grew significantly for various reasons: large binary assets being committed to the main repository, optional submodules growing in size, etc. To remedy this, we have changed the way external dependencies are handled. But to truly reduce the size of the repository to something manageable, it was necessary to prune large binary files from the git history. This means introducing breaking changes and invalidating existing commit SHA1 numbers.

How To Upgrade?

If you are using libigl as a submodule, I suggest you simply remove the submodule and add it again. To remove a submodule you can write (replacing external/libigl with the relative path to libigl in your repo): 

git submodule deinit external/libigl
git rm -rf external/libigl

And to add it again: 

git submodule add https://github.com/libigl/libigl.git external/libigl

Before commmit your changes, here is what the output of git status should look like: 

On branch master
Your branch is up to date with 'origin/master'.

Changes to be committed:
  (use "git reset HEAD <file>..." to unstage)

  modified:   .gitmodules
  modified:   external/libigl

Submodule changes to be committed:

* external/libigl 7371494...ed363da:
  Warn: external/libigl doesn't contain commit 737149498ad3d25ea1a56dc4234a66d2876764ef

The warning is normal: this is because submodule was referencing an old commit (7371494) that no longer exists in the new history, but the new commit (ed363da) does.

If you have an existing fork of libigl, we strongly suggest that you delete it and fork the project anew. You will not be able to create a PR with a fork that has the old history. If you have existing changes (e.g. from a pending PR), then simply apply the same changes on the newly forked project, and submit your PR again.

If you are new to libigl, there is nothing to do: use the new repository normally, and enjoy the new lightness!

What About My Old Code?

We maintain a copy of libigl with the old history in the repository libigl-legacy. If you have an old code the depends on a specific version of libigl, simply update the url (e.g. by editing the .gitmodules file), and it will pick up the matching commit with the SHA1 number from the old history.

Troubleshooting

Problem 1

I have an old project with a submodule using libigl, but it is pointing to an invalid commit number:

Submodule 'libigl' (git@github.com:libigl/libigl.git) registered for path 'external/libigl'
Cloning into '/home/user/foo/libigl-example-project/external/libigl'...
error: Server does not allow request for unadvertised object 03536c4aa44a399ed7134b68f04cf3773edebc73
Fetched in submodule path 'external/libigl', but it did not contain 03536c4aa44a399ed7134b68f04cf3773edebc73. Direct fetching of that commit failed.
How to fix

Steps to reproduce the problem:

  1. Suppose we have a parent project with libigl submodule in external/libigl/.
  2. Clone the parent repository 
    git clone git@github.com:gabuzome/libigl-example-project.git
  3. Try to initialize the submodules with the command 
    git submodule update --init --recursive
    this should produces the error you see above.

Steps to fix the problem (execute in that order):

  1. Delete the local folder that contained the submodule 
    rm -rf external/libigl/
  2. Delete the corrupted copy in the .git/ folder 
    rm -rf .git/modules/external/libigl/
  3. Change the libigl/libigl.git to libigl/libigl-legacy.git in the .gitmodules file.

    Or issue, on Linux 

    sed -i 's|libigl/libigl.git|libigl/libigl-legacy.git|' .gitmodules
    Or issue, on Mac OS X 
    sed -i '' 's|libigl/libigl.git|libigl/libigl-legacy.git|' .gitmodules

  4. Update local configuration of your submodule repos with the new URL 
    git submodule sync
  5. Clone the submodule with the new address 
    git submodule update --init --recursive

Problem 2

I have a problem with my current project that I want to update to the latest version, but I messed up my submodule and somehow get this error message:

A git directory for 'external/libigl' is found locally with remote(s):
  origin  https://github.com/libigl/libigl.git
If you want to reuse this local git directory instead of cloning again from
  https://github.com/libigl/libigl.git
use the '--force' option. If the local git directory is not the correct repo
or you are unsure what this means choose another name with the '--name' option.
How to fix

Steps to fix the problem (execute in that order):

  1. Delete the local folder that contained the submodule 
    rm -rf external/libigl/
  2. Delete the corrupted copy in the .git/ folder 
    rm -rf .git/modules/external/libigl/
  3. Update local configuration of your submodule repos with the new URL 
    git submodule sync
  4. Clone the submodule to the current tip of the repository 
    git submodule update --init --recursive

Problem 3

I have updated my submodule to the latest version of libigl, but the CMake script is complaining about missing targets.

How to fix

The files in the libigl repository have been restructured a little bit. The CMake build script are now located under cmake/ instead of shared/cmake/. Please check out the latest version of the FindLIBIGL.cmake from the libigl-example-project.

Problem 4

I have an existing fork with some changes, how do I update it to the latest version of libigl?

How to fix

For now we advise that you keep a copy of your legacy fork (you can rename/archive your existing fork, etc.), and create a new fork from the current libigl repository. If you have existing changes that you would like to merge, you can also try to cherry-pick the individual commits, but the simplest solution might to recreate new commits with the desired changes.

Other Problems

Please check out the changelog page for the list of changes that have been merged into the main branch.