setup: opt-out of check with safe.directory=*

With the addition of the safe.directory in 8959555ce
(setup_git_directory(): add an owner check for the top-level directory,
2022-03-02) released in v2.35.2, we are receiving feedback from a
variety of users about the feature.

Some users have a very large list of shared repositories and find it
cumbersome to add this config for every one of them.

In a more difficult case, certain workflows involve running Git commands
within containers. The container boundary prevents any global or system
config from communicating `safe.directory` values from the host into the
container. Further, the container almost always runs as a different user
than the owner of the directory in the host.

To simplify the reactions necessary for these users, extend the
definition of the safe.directory config value to include a possible '*'
value. This value implies that all directories are safe, providing a
single setting to opt-out of this protection.

Note that an empty assignment of safe.directory clears all previous
values, and this is already the case with the "if (!value || !*value)"
condition.

Signed-off-by: Derrick Stolee <derrickstolee@github.com>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>

1 files changed, 7 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/Documentation/config/safe.txt b/Documentation/config/safe.txt
index 63597b2df8..6d764fe0cc 100644
--- a/Documentation/config/safe.txt
+++ b/Documentation/config/safe.txt
@@ -19,3 +19,10 @@ line option `-c safe.directory=<path>`.
 The value of this setting is interpolated, i.e. `~/<path>` expands to a
 path relative to the home directory and `%(prefix)/<path>` expands to a
 path relative to Git's (runtime) prefix.
++
+To completely opt-out of this security check, set `safe.directory` to the
+string `*`. This will allow all repositories to be treated as if their
+directory was listed in the `safe.directory` list. If `safe.directory=*`
+is set in system config and you want to re-enable this protection, then
+initialize your list with an empty value before listing the repositories
+that you deem safe.