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"git gc" removes ".git/refs/heads/master".

Subject: "git gc" removes ".git/refs/heads/master".

## tl;dr

5 messages between Jan 29, 2009 and Jan 29, 2009.

replies: 4people: 5as markdown or json

Bernd Lommerzheim· Jan 29, 2009, 19:31 UTC · lore

Hi,

maybe I found a bug in git. When I execute "git gc" in my local repository, git removes the file ".git/refs/heads/master". Is this an intended behavior (but why?) or is that a bug?

Some commands to reproduce:
~ $ mkdir tmp; cd tmp
~/tmp $ git init
Initialized empty Git repository in /home/myuser/tmp/.git/
~/tmp $ echo "content" > a
~/tmp $ git add .
~/tmp $ git commit -a -m "first commit"
Created initial commit 0b67f33: first commit
 1 files changed, 1 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
 create mode 100644 a
~/tmp $ cat .git/refs/heads/master
0b67f33fff4152a912fdbe8819480b8fc1f2e990
~/tmp $ git gc
Counting objects: 3, done.
Writing objects: 100% (3/3), done.
Total 3 (delta 0), reused 0 (delta 0)
~/tmp $ cat .git/refs/heads/master
cat: .git/refs/heads/master: No such file or directory
~/tmp $ cat .git/HEAD
ref: refs/heads/master
~/tmp $

I tested this with git v1.6.0.6, v1.6.1.1 and the current master (a34a9dbb..).

Best regards,

Bernd Lommerzheim

Johannes Schindelin· Jan 29, 2009, 19:50 UTC · re: Bernd Lommerzheim · lore

Re: "git gc" removes ".git/refs/heads/master".

Hi,

On Thu, 29 Jan 2009, Bernd Lommerzheim wrote:

> maybe I found a bug in git. When I execute "git gc" in my local 
> repository, git removes the file ".git/refs/heads/master". Is this an 
> intended behavior (but why?) or is that a bug?

No, it packs the refs. You have no business accessing files in .git/ directly :-)

Ciao, Dscho

Johannes Gilger· Jan 29, 2009, 19:51 UTC · re: Bernd Lommerzheim · lore

Re: "git gc" removes ".git/refs/heads/master".

On 2009-01-29, Bernd Lommerzheim <bernd@lommerzheim.com> wrote:

> maybe I found a bug in git. When I execute "git gc" in my local repository,
> git removes the file ".git/refs/heads/master". Is this an intended behavior
> (but why?) or is that a bug?

Good question, and I just found that one out myself. The ref has been "packed" (git help pack-refs) and can be found in .git/packed-refs. Hope that answers your question.

Greetings, Jojo

-- 
Johannes Gilger <heipei@hackvalue.de>
http://hackvalue.de/heipei/
GPG-Key: 0x42F6DE81
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Peter Baumann· Jan 29, 2009, 19:55 UTC · re: Bernd Lommerzheim · lore

Re: "git gc" removes ".git/refs/heads/master".

On Thu, Jan 29, 2009 at 08:31:17PM +0100, Bernd Lommerzheim wrote:

Show 6 quoted lines

> Hi,
> 
> maybe I found a bug in git. When I execute "git gc" in my local repository,
> git removes the file ".git/refs/heads/master". Is this an intended behavior
> (but why?) or is that a bug?
>

This is intential, as git gc creates .git/packed-refs in which the contents of your master branch are stored. The packed-refs help speeding up the listing of your branches if you have many of them (e.g. many old historical ones).

Regards, Peter Baumann

Junio C Hamano· Jan 29, 2009, 20:07 UTC · re: Bernd Lommerzheim · lore

Re: "git gc" removes ".git/refs/heads/master".

Bernd Lommerzheim <bernd@lommerzheim.com> writes:

Show 27 quoted lines

> Hi,
>
> maybe I found a bug in git. When I execute "git gc" in my local repository,
> git removes the file ".git/refs/heads/master". Is this an intended behavior
> (but why?) or is that a bug?
>
> Some commands to reproduce:
> ~ $ mkdir tmp; cd tmp
> ~/tmp $ git init
> Initialized empty Git repository in /home/myuser/tmp/.git/
> ~/tmp $ echo "content" > a
> ~/tmp $ git add .
> ~/tmp $ git commit -a -m "first commit"
> Created initial commit 0b67f33: first commit
>  1 files changed, 1 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
>  create mode 100644 a
> ~/tmp $ cat .git/refs/heads/master
> 0b67f33fff4152a912fdbe8819480b8fc1f2e990
> ~/tmp $ git gc
> Counting objects: 3, done.
> Writing objects: 100% (3/3), done.
> Total 3 (delta 0), reused 0 (delta 0)
> ~/tmp $ cat .git/refs/heads/master
> cat: .git/refs/heads/master: No such file or directory
> ~/tmp $ cat .git/HEAD
> ref: refs/heads/master
> ~/tmp $

$ grep master .git/packed-refs