builtin/clone: introduce --ref-format= value flag

Introduce a new `--ref-format` value flag for git-clone(1) that allows
the user to specify the ref format that is to be used for a newly
initialized repository.

Signed-off-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>

Documentation/git-clone.txt

@@ -311,6 +311,12 @@ or `--mirror` is given)
 	The result is Git repository can be separated from working
 	tree.
 
+--ref-format=<ref-format::
+
+Specify the given ref storage format for the repository. The valid values are:
++
+include::ref-storage-format.txt[]
+
 -j <n>::
 --jobs <n>::
 	The number of submodules fetched at the same time.

builtin/clone.c

@@ -72,6 +72,7 @@ static char *remote_name = NULL;
 static char *option_branch = NULL;
 static struct string_list option_not = STRING_LIST_INIT_NODUP;
 static const char *real_git_dir;
+static const char *ref_format;
 static char *option_upload_pack = "git-upload-pack";
 static int option_verbosity;
 static int option_progress = -1;
@@ -157,6 +158,8 @@ static struct option builtin_clone_options[] = {
 		    N_("any cloned submodules will be shallow")),
 	OPT_STRING(0, "separate-git-dir", &real_git_dir, N_("gitdir"),
 		   N_("separate git dir from working tree")),
+	OPT_STRING(0, "ref-format", &ref_format, N_("format"),
+		   N_("specify the reference format to use")),
 	OPT_STRING_LIST('c', "config", &option_config, N_("key=value"),
 			N_("set config inside the new repository")),
 	OPT_STRING_LIST(0, "server-option", &server_options,
@@ -932,6 +935,7 @@ int cmd_clone(int argc, const char **argv, const char *prefix)
 	int submodule_progress;
 	int filter_submodules = 0;
 	int hash_algo;
+	unsigned int ref_storage_format = REF_STORAGE_FORMAT_UNKNOWN;
 	const int do_not_override_repo_unix_permissions = -1;
 
 	struct transport_ls_refs_options transport_ls_refs_options =
@@ -957,6 +961,12 @@ int cmd_clone(int argc, const char **argv, const char *prefix)
 	if (option_single_branch == -1)
 		option_single_branch = deepen ? 1 : 0;
 
+	if (ref_format) {
+		ref_storage_format = ref_storage_format_by_name(ref_format);
+		if (ref_storage_format == REF_STORAGE_FORMAT_UNKNOWN)
+			die(_("unknown ref storage format '%s'"), ref_format);
+	}
+
 	if (option_mirror)
 		option_bare = 1;
 
@@ -1108,7 +1118,7 @@ int cmd_clone(int argc, const char **argv, const char *prefix)
 	 * their on-disk data structures.
 	 */
 	init_db(git_dir, real_git_dir, option_template, GIT_HASH_UNKNOWN,
-		REF_STORAGE_FORMAT_UNKNOWN, NULL,
+		ref_storage_format, NULL,
 		do_not_override_repo_unix_permissions, INIT_DB_QUIET | INIT_DB_SKIP_REFDB);
 
 	if (real_git_dir) {

t/t5601-clone.sh

@@ -157,6 +157,23 @@ test_expect_success 'clone --mirror does not repeat tags' '
 
 '
 
+test_expect_success 'clone with files ref format' '
+	test_when_finished "rm -rf ref-storage" &&
+	git clone --ref-format=files --mirror src ref-storage &&
+	echo files >expect &&
+	git -C ref-storage rev-parse --show-ref-format >actual &&
+	test_cmp expect actual
+'
+
+test_expect_success 'clone with garbage ref format' '
+	cat >expect <<-EOF &&
+	fatal: unknown ref storage format ${SQ}garbage${SQ}
+	EOF
+	test_must_fail git clone --ref-format=garbage --mirror src ref-storage 2>err &&
+	test_cmp expect err &&
+	test_path_is_missing ref-storage
+'
+
 test_expect_success 'clone to destination with trailing /' '
 
 	git clone src target-1/ &&