Re: git push from client is not updating files on server

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Mar 6, 2012, 19:35 UTC
Message-ID: <7vsjhlsetn.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org>
In-Reply-To: <jj5ih2$f0m$1@dough.gmane.org>

[jc: resurrected JY as recipient]

Ben Tebulin <nntp.20.jexpert@spamgourmet.com> writes:

> You can only push to "bare-only repositories". These do not contain a
> working tree but only a .git directory.

That's a bit too strong. You do not have to limit your "push" into "bare repositories" (drop "-only", there is no such word), but it is perfectly fine to use "push" as a way to emulate a "fetch" that you would wish you could but you cannot in the opposite direction.

What "push" does not do is to touch the working tree, and this is intuitively understandable once you realize that "push" is an opposite of "fetch".

> My push seems to be successful too using the command below as I get
> the message "Everything up-to-date".
> 
> git push

It is somewhat strange that this _succeeded_.

When pushing into a repository with a working tree (i.e. "a non-bare repository") and especially when trying to update its current branch with such a push, "git push" would by default be refused, unless you tweak a configuration variable or two on the receiving end. That is an expert feature and I do not think that is being in use in this particular scenario, so perhaps the push did _not_ succeed to update the branch Jerome thought it updated, but instead updated a branch that is _not_ the one that is checked out in the repository on the receiving end of this push.