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Git "Permission Denied" errors on DFS path only with newer versions

From
ELErwan Leroy <erwan@erwanleroy.com>
Date
Jun 27, 2025, 00:14 UTC
Message-ID
<CADT1yYmQGG5mQnWk=+19UOEvcDyiUQmWsib9jUJsPDc=A27vMw@mail.gmail.com>
Hello.

I'm writing to see if maybe this is a known issue, or if there is a possible known workaround. I've not been part of this mailing list before so I hope the format I'm using for reporting is going to be correct/helpful (this is attempt #2, I did not set plain text the first time).

A bit of context: At work, we are fully Windows-based, and mount our network drives through DFS. We are fully cut-off from the internet so everything we run is local to the internal network, which makes certain tests a bit more time-consuming than they should be. We have been working for years with Git and a self-hosted gitlab server, and have had no issues. Recently, some of the new hires started reporting lots of Git errors, mostly apparent permission denied errors.

One of the errors: PS Y:\Users\xx\Public\dev\test_for_it> git remote add origin git@gitlab.xx.local:xx/test.git Rename from '//atl-xx/Basecamp_Atl/Users/xx/Public/dev/test_for_it/.git/config.lock' to '//atl-xx/Basecamp_Atl/Users/xx/Public/dev/test_for_it/.git/config' failed. Should I try again? (y/n) n error: could not write config file .git/config: Permission denied fatal: could not set 'remote.origin.url' to 'git@gitlab.xx.local:xx/test.git'

What we found out:
- The first thing we found out was that only network drives were affected.
- The second thing we noticed was that not only new employees after a
certain date were getting issues, but also longer employees getting
new workstations. This started to make an actual permission issue less
likely, as there was no change to their user permissions.
- Then we noticed that the delimiting factor was the Git version:
Users on Git 2.21 and older had no problems. Users on Git 2.36 and
newer (we also had some users on 2.47, and today downloaded and tested
the latest 2.50). I would have tested every version in the range 2.21
to 2.36 to help narrow exactly where it breaks, but I can't find
pre-compiled versions for old versions and I'm not currently set up
for compiling from source.
- We also recently found out it only breaks when accessing through
DFS, if we directly access the corresponding UNC path (what DFS
resolves to), we do not get the same error.

It's not excluded that there is something wrong with our network, but the fact that it works with older git versions and not with newer ones makes me think git has a role to play in our issues. I wasn't able to find a changelog, if nobody is able to look into our issue closer I'd love to at least be pointed in the right direction to see the changes that happened between 2.21 and 2.36.

Thank you in advance, Erwan

Next: brian m. carlson
Message 1 of 5 in “Git "Permission Denied" errors on DFS path only with newer versions”
  1. Erwan LeroyJun 27, 2025
  2. brian m. carlsonJun 27, 2025
  3. D. Ben KnobleJun 27, 2025
  4. Johannes SchindelinJun 30, 2025
  5. Erwan LeroyJul 1, 2025

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