From: Junio C Hamano Date: Thu, 06 Aug 2026 20:12:11 GMT Subject: Re: [PATCH v3 1/2] rebase: skip branch symref aliases Message-ID: In-Reply-To: <0844b4e0-679b-4c0a-bea1-5779b4d0489d@gmail.com> Phillip Wood writes: > On 29/07/2026 15:26, Junio C Hamano wrote: >> Phillip Wood writes: >> >>>> But that was about a low level mechanism that must be more lenient >>>> to be usable as repair tools to recover from such a broken state, >>>> no? >>> >>> It checks the new value of HEAD, not the old one so I don't think so. >>> The commit message talks about topgit using "git symbolic-ref" to set >>> head outside "refs/heads/" - peff had previously tried to tighten it to >>> reject non-branch refs but that broke topgit. I've just had a quick look >>> at the topgit code and still sets HEAD to point to "refs/top-bases/..." >>> by default[1], although there are plans to start using >>> "refs/heads/{top-bases}/..." instead. >> >> Ah, that name vaguely rings a bell. Is it still in use, and now >> they prevent us from forbidding funny characters like {} in the >> refname? Sigh... > > Yes, it still seems to be maintained, I guess they chose the funny > characters to try and avoid name collisions because no-one would want > them in a "normal" branch name. > > Thanks I guess I dropped the ball here. So given that we are OK to see HEAD pointing outside refs/heads/, this subthread should be closed. My understanding is that we still have an issue reported by Erik in that needs to be addressed before this topic can move further? Thanks.