[[!comment format=mdwn username="http://joeyh.name/" ip="4.154.0.140" subject="comment 8" date="2013-07-20T20:07:53Z" content=""" `dd bs=1024 count=100000 if=/dev/zero of=bigfile` obviously creates the same data each time, so if that same size empty file has previously been in a repository, and the content is still present there, the symlink will automatically point to it when it gets added. In other words, git-annex performs automatic deduplication of file contents, and so it was able to save you a download in this case. """]]