[PATCH v5 2/2] rebase: set REF_HEAD_DETACH in checkout_up_to_date()

From: John Cai via GitGitGadget <gitgitgadget@gmail.com>
Date: Mar 18, 2022, 13:54 UTC
Message-ID: <1dd5bb210124480132a78e5ac64384713d734299.1647611643.git.gitgitgadget@gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <pull.1226.v5.git.git.1647611643.gitgitgadget@gmail.com>

From: John Cai <johncai86@gmail.com>

"git rebase A B" where B is not a commit should behave as if the HEAD got detached at B and then the detached HEAD got rebased on top of A. A bug however overwrites the current branch to point at B, when B is a descendant of A (i.e. the rebase ends up being a fast-forward). See [1] for the original bug report.

The callstack from checkout_up_to_date() is the following:

cmd_rebase()
-> checkout_up_to_date()
   -> reset_head()
      -> update_refs()
         -> update_ref()

When B is not a valid branch but an oid, rebase sets the head_name of rebase_options to NULL. This value gets passed down this call chain through the branch member of reset_head_opts also getting set to NULL all the way to update_refs().

Then update_refs() checks ropts.branch to decide whether or not to switch branches. If ropts.branch is NULL, it calls update_ref() to update HEAD. At this point however, from rebase's point of view, we want a detached HEAD. But, since checkout_up_to_date() does not set the RESET_HEAD_DETACH flag, the update_ref() call will deference HEAD and update the branch its pointing to. We want the HEAD detached at B instead.

Fix this bug by adding the RESET_HEAD_DETACH flag in checkout_up_to_date if B is not a valid branch, so that once reset_head() calls update_refs(), it calls update_ref() with REF_NO_DEREF which updates HEAD directly intead of deferencing it and updating the branch that HEAD points to.

Also add a test to ensure the correct behavior.

[1] https://lore.kernel.org/git/YiokTm3GxIZQQUow@newk/

Reported-by: Michael McClimon <michael@mcclimon.org>
Signed-off-by: John Cai <johncai86@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
---
 builtin/rebase.c  | 2 ++
 t/t3400-rebase.sh | 9 +++++++++
 2 files changed, 11 insertions(+)

diff --git a/builtin/rebase.c b/builtin/rebase.c
index b29ad2b65e7..27fde7bf281 100644
--- a/builtin/rebase.c
+++ b/builtin/rebase.c
@@ -829,6 +829,8 @@ static int checkout_up_to_date(struct rebase_options *options)
 	ropts.oid = &options->orig_head;
 	ropts.branch = options->head_name;
 	ropts.flags = RESET_HEAD_RUN_POST_CHECKOUT_HOOK;
+	if (!ropts.branch)
+		ropts.flags |=  RESET_HEAD_DETACH;
 	ropts.head_msg = buf.buf;
 	if (reset_head(the_repository, &ropts) < 0)
 		ret = error(_("could not switch to %s"), options->switch_to);
diff --git a/t/t3400-rebase.sh b/t/t3400-rebase.sh
index 0643d015255..d5a8ee39fc4 100755
--- a/t/t3400-rebase.sh
+++ b/t/t3400-rebase.sh
@@ -394,6 +394,15 @@ test_expect_success 'switch to branch not checked out' '
 	git rebase main other
 '
 
+test_expect_success 'switch to non-branch detaches HEAD' '
+	git checkout main &&
+	old_main=$(git rev-parse HEAD) &&
+	git rebase First Second^0 &&
+	test_cmp_rev HEAD Second &&
+	test_cmp_rev main $old_main &&
+	test_must_fail git symbolic-ref HEAD
+'
+
 test_expect_success 'refuse to switch to branch checked out elsewhere' '
 	git checkout main &&
 	git worktree add wt &&

-- 
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