A git-annex key has this format:
BACKEND[-sNNNN][-mNNNN][-SNNNN-CNNNN]--NAME
For example:
SHA256E-s31390--f50d7ac4c6b9031379986bc362fcefb65f1e52621ce1708d537e740fefc59cc0.mp3
- The backend is one of the key-value backends, which are always upper-cased.
- The name field at the end has a format dependent on the backend. It is always the last field, and is prefixed with "--". Unlike other fields, it may contain "-" in its content. It should not contain newline characters or "/"; otherwise nearly anything goes.
- The "-s" field is optional, and is the size of the content in bytes.
- The "-m" field is optional, and is the mtime of the file when it was added to git-annex, expressed as seconds from the epoch. This is currently only used by the WORM backend.
- The "-S" and "-C" fields are only used for keys that are chunks of some other key. "-S" is the size of the chunk, and "-C" is the chunk number (starting at 1).
- Other fields could be added in the future, if needed.
git-annex always puts the fields in the order shown above when serializing a key. It can parse keys with the fields in other orders (although the name field must always come last).
The git annex examinekey
command can be used to extract information from
a key.