Can I arrange repositories into folders on Github?
GitGithubRepositoryGit Problem Overview
I am new to git and what I am doing now is to upload all my recent projects as repositories to github. There are a lot of different projects like webdesign, wordpress themes and different types of applications. And some of these also belong to bigger projects because they were about testing some stuff as a different application.
The problem is that I have a confusing amount of repositories online now. How can I group related github repositories in a folder structure? Is there a feature providing any ability to order and structure or even tag repositories on github?
Git Solutions
Solution 1 - Git
Update Dec. 2021:
> ## Lists are now available as a public beta
> Lists level up the starring experience by making it easy to organize and curate your favorite repositories on GitHub.
>
> You can create public lists that appear on your stars page at https://github.com/USERNAME?tab=stars.
>
> Lists are available to everyone except enterprise managed users.
>
> 
Original answer:
On GitHub itself, you cannot group your repos by "folder", unless you create organizations.
See SublimeText, for instance, as a group of all sublimeText packages repos.
But that won't support a nested folder organization. For now (June 2017), that only supports a nested team organization structure.
Update Aug. 2020: the README project allows you to add a profile page... in which you can list and organize your repositories any way you want. But that is a manual process (editing the page).
Update February 2019: you now have the concept of project:
See "User owned projects—your personal workspace "
> You can also link up to 5 repositories to your project board. Linking repositories will limit the scope of the search to those linked repositories, so you can quickly narrow down any new issues you haven’t yet added to the project board
GitHub also supports tags now (in the form of topics).
Original answers 2012:
Another solution is for you to define repositories which reference other repos, declared as submodules.
That way, when you are cloning one of the repos (which references other repos), called "parent repos", they will be cloned in their own directory, with a sub-directory per submodules.
It won't be visually apparent on your GitHub account itself (as it will still contains a large list of repos, even larger with the parent repos), but by cloning one parent repo, you will get back all its associated submodules in it.
The issue 302 mentioned in the comments by AnneTheAgile in 2014 just references now (Nov. 2018) tbnorth/github_repo_tags
> The small python program in this repository uses the GitHub API to get a list of your repos. and add their name, description, and URL, to a new repo., by default called repo_tags. Initially each “issue” is tagged unclassified, but you can tag them as you please, using regular issue tagging.
>
> When re-run, repo_tags.py only creates issues for repos. that weren't already covered by an issue.
Solution 2 - Git
I use Organizations to arrange repos. This allows for clean delineation and clear organization, ripe for sharing if needed. For example:
My Organizations
- Jmr-iOS (iOS repos)
- Jmr-Work (Work repos)
- User Acct (Pers repos)
All organization repos are public though unless you upgrade to an Enterprise Cloud account ($25/mo) As of September 2020 you can have unlimited public/private repositories under an Organization. (see options here)
Solution 3 - Git
This is not an answer so much as a heads up.
One recent side effect of structuring utilizing organizations has come to light due to the following announcement of free private repos for users: https://blog.github.com/2019-01-07-new-year-new-github/
Organization private repos are still not free. So using organizations to separate repos will result in your organization's inability to utilize free private repos, if that's something you need.
Solution 4 - Git
One possible way to simulate folders is by appending comma-separated tags to the end of your repo description. You can then search for repos by these tags, since the GitHub 'Find a repository...' filter looks in the repo description! An example:
> MyRepo: Does some cool stuff [computer-vision, machine-learning, python]
Solution 5 - Git
For starters, you can tag repos now in GitHub, in the form of topics. Yay!
But I don't think it solves the bigger problem. For this, I have tried a top level folder system (where each project is a folder in one repo). I have also tried a one branch per project system (where each project is in a new branch). This last one allows you to pull and push each project separately too! But, neither is ideal.
You can also look into other version control systems like subversion and mercurial. Mercurial can also be hosted on Bitbucket if you need, and Facebook is even looking into support for "multi-project repositories".
I personally like the system of https://hg.openjdk.java.net/ (or http://hg.netbeans.org/), where you have a folder setup and each project is hosted at endpoints. The best way to achieve this is through creating a website (which you can do in GitHub) with your project structure (like https://mvnrepository.com/ or https://www.npmjs.com/).
Solution 6 - Git
Drawbacks with the Projects approach include:
- The project (i.e. "folder") in which a repo resides isn't usually visible, for example in the Homepage or your Profile. To make this visible in those places would require a manual tag in the repo's name, for example like @peter554 suggests. But then changing the "folder" (i.e. project) requires changing both the project and the manual tag in the repo's name.
- You cannot add forks to a project.
These problems are not present with the Organizations approach. However:
- Your "foldered" repos will disappear from your account profile page. But organisations can be made visible there by becoming a public member. (can be set under "people" within organizations)
notice: These things may be subject to change as Github develops further.
Solution 7 - Git
So it is confirmed that there is no folder function in Github.
I think to organize repositories, you could have 2 approaches.
-
to use a file system, each file refer to one repository, they are just a link to GitHub, put them inside the folder with folder names as the categories ( a python script could generate all files, and you drag and drop)
- cons: it assumes the structure is a tree, so one repo maximum have one parent( one category)
- code : https://gist.github.com/AronWaterAron/0e2af669f942c95306123b1fcd556126
-
organize using a directed graph ( no existing tool, you need to build a web or desktop app to do that, I am coding this out)
