cgit expects a README
formatter with a peculiar
mode of operation, where it receives a “filename” as its first argument, but
doesn't open it. Instead, it's meant to use it as a cue to determine the format,
then read from standard input, on which cgit will provide the README
it
extracts from the repository by whatever magic libgit
call. The included
formatter is a shell script that makes further calls out to assorted python
scripts. This replaces that whole mess with a single statically-linkable
executable, so in your cgitrc
you can write:
about-filter=/whatever/bin/about-filter
and keep your chroot
or container or what-have-you nice and small.
Functionality is equivalent to the script(s) included with cgit, with the exception of manpage support.