how to use "repo" to clone minimal android source?

Question

I am able to clone the Android source code by using the "repo" tool. However, what I want to do is clone the source code in a more minimal way than having an 11GB footprint. It seems to download things related to every Android device and every prior release. I tried thought I could reduce this by checking out a specific branch like this:

repo init -u https://android.googlesource.com/platform/manifest -b android-4.0.1_r1

However, what ends up happening is that I still get everything involved, just at a specific snapshot (understandable). But is there any way to limit the amount that is cloned?

Answer 1

The android source tree is made up of many separate git repositories, which are all managed by repo. You can't really reduce the amount of data that's downloaded for a given git repository.

However, you can only download a subset of the git repos that are available, using repo sync <project>. I.e. if you only wanted the frameworks/base package, you should be able to do repo sync frameworks/base, after doing the initial repo init.

If you are actually wanting to build the source though, you probably want the full thing.

You might be able to save a gig or two by removing the device repositories that you don't need. You can do this by editing <source>/.repo/manifest.xml and removing the repositories for the devices you don't want.