Using git at a hackathon where git:// port is blocked

Stuck in a network where the git:// protocol is blocked ( port 9418)?

I was. At a hackathon and having to do bower install, where a lot of packages were installed through “git://” from Github. Unfortunately, the port was blocked and the installation was not going through.

One option under such scenarios is to ask git to use the https:// protocol ( hopefully, that one is open ) instead of the git://.

It can be simply done as follow:

git config --global url."https://".insteadOf "git://"

This is not just for changing the protocol, but for replacing the beginning part of ANY url with the one you specify. In our case, we are replacing urls beginning with git:// to https://.

A simple solution, instead of having to get the port opened, etc. Just remember to unset this config once done.