Re: Running 'git pull' from an unnamed branch

From: Björn Steinbrink <b.steinbrink@gmx.de>
Date: Apr 5, 2009, 22:08 UTC
Message-ID: <20090405220855.GA20356@atjola.homenet>
In-Reply-To: <3f4fd2640904051433u199587c3wc9bf080d138944e7@mail.gmail.com>

On 2009.04.05 22:33:57 +0100, Reece Dunn wrote:

Show 26 quoted lines

> $ git pull
> You asked me to pull without telling me which branch you
> want to merge with, and 'branch..merge' in
> your configuration file does not tell me either.  Please
> name which branch you want to merge on the command line and
> try again (e.g. 'git pull <repository> <refspec>').
> See git-pull(1) for details on the refspec.
> 
> If you often merge with the same branch, you may want to
> configure the following variables in your configuration
> file:
> 
>     branch..remote = <nickname>
>     branch..merge = <remote-ref>
>     remote.<nickname>.url = <url>
>     remote.<nickname>.fetch = <refspec>
> 
> See git-config(1) for details.
> 
> $ git branch
> * (no branch)
>   master
> 
> Running `git checkout master && git pull` fixed the above issue. The
> patch below improves the error message for users that are in this
> state.

It doesn't "fix" anything, you're simply doing something different.

"git pull" while on a detached HEAD can't work, there are no defaults that could be used. But e.g. "git pull origin master" would do, fetching "master" from "origin" and merging it to the commit you have checked out.

Your "git checkout master && git pull" does something else. It uses the configured pull defaults for "master" to fetch something and merge it to "master".

> Also, is "branch..remote" valid? Should this be "branch.remote"?

That's a bug, but it should not be branch.remote. The config setting is branch.<name>.remote. As you were on a detached HEAD, there is no "<name>", and the code that generates the error message doesn't handle that correctly. I'd even say that in this case, the whole "If you often merge ..." part makes no sense at all, you simply can't setup pull defaults for a detached HEAD.

> +	echo "You may not be on a branch. In this case, you need to move"
> +	echo "onto the branch you want to pull to (usually master):"

Hm? Neither do you really need to move to a branch, nor is "master" really _that_ special that it is warranted to recommend checking it out... IMHO.

Björn