Actually, you can, with sparse checkouts. They've been in since git 1.7, if I remember correctly. It's not very user friendly yet, and you do retain the entire

Actually, you can, with sparse checkouts. They've been in since git 1.7, if I remember correctly. It's not very user friendly yet, and you do retain the entire path from the repository root. See for example here: http://vmiklos.hu/blog/sparse-checkout-example-in-git-1-7 http://vmiklos.hu/blog/sparse-checkout-example-in-git-1-7