Re: Git branch bug

From: Daniel Barkalow <barkalow@iabervon.org>
Date: May 5, 2007, 17:05 UTC
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0705051253380.28708@iabervon.org>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0705051841200.4015@racer.site>

On Sat, 5 May 2007, Johannes Schindelin wrote:

Show 16 quoted lines

> Hi,
> 
> On Sat, 5 May 2007, Guido Ostkamp wrote:
> 
> > $ mkdir test
> > $ cd test
> > $ git init
> > Initialized empty Git repository in .git/
> > $ git branch experimental
> > fatal: Not a valid object name: 'master'.
> > 
> > So, it seems it is not possible to create a named branch on an empty
> > repository.
> 
> Actually, it is not possible to branch from a non-existing branch. So, 
> this is somewhat expected from my POV.

This leaves open the question of how you make your initial commit in a branch that isn't master. I think the answer should be:

 $ git checkout -b experimental
 warning: You appear to be on a branch yet to be born.
 warning: Forcing checkout of HEAD.
 fatal: just how do you expect me to merge 0 trees?

Which should probably be:

 $ git checkout -b experimental
 warning: You appear to be on a branch yet to be born.
 warning: Putting you on a new branch yet to be born.

And leaving .git/HEAD pointing to refs/heads/experimental instead of refs/heads/master, with refs/heads/ still empty.

 $ git branch experimental

Should probably give a more informative error message, but branches with no commits that aren't the current branch has no existance at all, so it can't work to create them without switching to them.

	-Daniel
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