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Re: [PATCH] config: retry acquiring config.lock for 100ms

From
Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date
May 11, 2026, 02:32 UTC
Message-ID
<xmqqcxz2vfpa.fsf@gitster.g>
In-Reply-To
<adYvSZeN0ZVqwRhi@pks.im>
Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im> writes:
Show 32 quoted lines
>> This bites in practice when running `git worktree add -b` concurrently
>> against the same repository. Each invocation makes several writes to
>> ".git/config" to set up branch tracking, and tooling that creates
>> worktrees in parallel sees intermittent failures. Worse, `git worktree
>> add` does not propagate the failed config write to its exit code: the
>> worktree is created and the command exits 0, but tracking
>> configuration is silently dropped.
>
> This very much sounds like a bug that is worth fixing independently.
>
>> The lock is held only for the duration of rewriting a small file, so
>> retrying for 100 ms papers over any realistic contention while still
>> failing fast if a stale lock has been left behind by a crashed
>> process. This mirrors what we already do for individual reference
>> locks (4ff0f01cb7 (refs: retry acquiring reference locks for 100ms,
>> 2017-08-21)).
>
> Famous last words :) Experience tells me that any timeout value that
> isn't excessive will eventually be hit in some production system. Which
> raises the question whether we want to make the timeout configurable,
> similar to "core.filesRefLockTimeout" and "core.packedRefsTimeout".
> ...
> Honestly though, I'm not really sure what to make with this. We could
> of course also add some validation that the configuration we want to set
> hasn't been modified meanwhile. But that would now lead to a situation
> where we have to update every single caller in our tree to make use of
> the new mechanism, which would be a bunch of work.
>
> And adding the timeout doesn't really change the status quo, either. We
> already have the case that we'll happily overwrite changes made by
> concurrent processes. The only thing that changes is that we make it
> more likely for concurrent changes to succeed.

We haven't heard any response to these points raised in the message I am responding to. Should I still keep the patch in my tree, hoping that a responses may come some day? I am tempted to discard the topic as it has been quite a while since we last looked at it.

Thanks.
Previous: Patrick SteinhardtNext: Patrick Steinhardt
Message 4 of 18 in “config: retry acquiring config.lock for 100ms”
  1. config: retry acquiring config.lock for 100msJoerg Thalheim, Apr 3, 2026
  2. Junio C HamanoApr 3, 2026
  3. Patrick SteinhardtApr 8, 2026
  4. Junio C HamanoMay 11, 2026
  5. Patrick SteinhardtMay 11, 2026
  6. Jörg ThalheimMay 11, 2026
  7. Patrick SteinhardtMay 11, 2026
  8. Johannes SchindelinMay 17, 2026
  9. config: retry acquiring config.lock, configurable via core.configLockTimeoutJoerg Thalheim, May 17, 2026
  10. Junio C HamanoMay 18, 2026
  11. Patrick SteinhardtMay 18, 2026
  12. Johannes SchindelinJul 8, 2026
  13. Junio C HamanoJul 8, 2026
  14. Johannes SchindelinMay 28, 2026
  15. Junio C HamanoMay 28, 2026
  16. Johannes SchindelinJul 7, 2026
  17. Junio C HamanoJul 7, 2026
  18. Junio C HamanoJul 23, 2026

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