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When downloading a 10 MB zip file from my github (free) repo, I received this error:

Error: blob is too big

... 10 MB doesn't seem that big for a binary download... but in either case, how do you download individual larger binary files from github or how do you set up github so that certain binary files in a project can be downloaded?

ina
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    It seems to be a limitation on Github when downloading blob files through the we interface. A solution is to retrieve it by cloning the repo – koopajah Feb 16 '13 at 10:43
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    this isn't very efficient when the repo is 1gb and you just need the 10mb zip... – ina Feb 16 '13 at 12:09
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    that's true, there are multiple methods to retrieve a specific file without cloning the whole repo : http://stackoverflow.com/a/2466755/1606729 http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1125476/git-retrieve-a-single-file-from-a-repository check `git archive`, bare repositories, or the `--depth` option for `git checkout` – koopajah Feb 16 '13 at 12:12

1 Answers1

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Github is doing this intentionally, to prevent project owners from distributing compiled binaries via Github.

They want Github to be a platform for sharing source code, not a platform for sharing files.
It is also a way to prevent misuse (distributing non-open movies/etc).

Google Code is unfortunately following their example, and will prevent project owners from uploading new files in a few months.

A solution is to host files on SourceForge or similar services.

Community
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Nicolas Raoul
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