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Re: index file screwed up

From
CLChuck Lever <cel@citi.umich.edu>
Date
Sep 28, 2005, 17:43 UTC
Message-ID
<433AD628.1020308@citi.umich.edu>
In-Reply-To
<Pine.LNX.4.58.0509280831130.3308@g5.osdl.org>
Linus Torvalds wrote:
Show 31 quoted lines
> 
> On Wed, 28 Sep 2005, Chuck Lever wrote:
> 
>>i was working with a version of git that had a bug in add_cache_entry() 
>>that introduced a sorting error in my index.
>>
>>[cel@dexter main]$ stg refresh -f
>>Refreshing patch "git-switch-branch"...AUTHORS: unmerged 
>>(098c1d3e9fe5c39b859ccff6c7d36d2c193d1b62)
>>AUTHORS: unmerged (098c1d3e9fe5c39b859ccff6c7d36d2c193d1b62)
>>COPYING: unmerged (d60c31a97a544b53039088d14fe9114583c0efc3)
>>COPYING: unmerged (d60c31a97a544b53039088d14fe9114583c0efc3)
>>INSTALL: unmerged (8d2bebd9d1824f1b7af5cfe6fbd11f9cbfde6d74)
>>INSTALL: unmerged (8d2bebd9d1824f1b7af5cfe6fbd11f9cbfde6d74)
>>MANIFEST.in: unmerged (581d0be2a5fb3569b06681b7d559f1279aa4104b)
>>MANIFEST.in: unmerged (581d0be2a5fb3569b06681b7d559f1279aa4104b)
>>README: unmerged (184ded8e08cb92a14b79c79f9919469ba352ab70)
>>README: unmerged (184ded8e08cb92a14b79c79f9919469ba352ab70)
>>...
>>fatal: git-write-tree: verify_merged: not able to write tree
>>stg refresh: git-write-tree failed
>>
>>[cel@dexter main]$
>>
>>how do i recover?
> 
> 
> You don't. Your index is toast.
> 
> Let's hope you didn't write any unsorted trees with _earlier_ (non-merge) 
> commits.
well, i did get this working, but i "cheated."

first i switched back to a known good version of git. then, before i received your advice, i replaced the damaged index file with a file system snapshot backup from a couple of hours earlier. after a couple of "stg refresh" commands, things seem back to normal.

it could be useful to have a few backup versions of the index file (like index.1, index.2, etc) and have write-tree rotate them before writing out a new index.

btw, the git version was my own, using a trie/list cache. it mostly works, except for this little sorting bug.

Show 27 quoted lines
> Do this:
> 
>  - build a new and trustworthy git somewhere else (from a tar-file if 
>    nothing else). Install it.
> 
>  - get rid of the index and any half-way data in your working tree (you 
>    might want to save any diffs with "git diff HEAD" first, but I suspect  
>    you don't really care, since the changes came from some stg stuff, so
>    you can always re-create them, no?)
> 
> 	git reset --hard HEAD
> 
>  - run fsck, to verify that all your trees are sorted (if they aren't, you 
>    be screwed, but "git-convert-objects" should be able to fix it for 
>    you - possibly with some additional logic).
> 
> 	git-fsck-objects --full
> 
>  - restart and try again.
> 
> That _should_ get you running again.
> 
> 		Linus
> -
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Previous: Linus Torvalds
Message 3 of 3 in “index file screwed up”
  1. Chuck LeverSep 28, 2005
  2. Linus TorvaldsSep 28, 2005
  3. Chuck LeverSep 28, 2005

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