# 'Unable to find remote helper'

4 messages from 2010-11-04 to 2010-11-08. Participants: Philip Boulton, Jonathan Nieder, Junio C Hamano.
Thread: https://gitlist.dev/t/25648

## Philip Boulton, 2010-11-04 21:59

Subject: 'Unable to find remote helper'
Message-ID: <F815EC90C848458886E418CB6DE1DA8B@ssipboulton>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/F815EC90C848458886E418CB6DE1DA8B%40ssipboulton

```
Been beating my head against this for a while:

Here's the problem I have:

$ git submodule init
$ git submodule update
Cloning into contrib/express...
fatal: Unable to find remote helper for 'http'
Clone of 'http://github.com/visionmedia/express.git' into submodule path
'contrib/express' failed


I have git version 1.7.3.1, built from source on FreeBSD 6.4
Prior to building I have curl and expat lib installed.

My git build commands are:
./configure
gmake clean && gmake all
gmake install

I've also tried the configure as follows:
./configure --with-curl=/usr/local --with-expat=/usr/local

in case it was looking elsewhere.  The behaviour I see in this case is
identical.

Philip B.

```

## Jonathan Nieder, 2010-11-04 22:40

Subject: Re: 'Unable to find remote helper'
Message-ID: <20101104224010.GA18693@burratino>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/20101104224010.GA18693%40burratino
In-Reply-To: <F815EC90C848458886E418CB6DE1DA8B@ssipboulton>

```
Hi Philip,

Philip Boulton wrote:

> My git build commands are:
> ./configure
> gmake clean && gmake all
> gmake install

The "gmake clean" undoes the effect of "./configure".

Hope that helps.

Signed-off-by: Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>
---
diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index d3dcfb1..c693652 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -2229,7 +2229,7 @@ dist-doc:
 ### Cleaning rules
 
 distclean: clean
-	$(RM) configure
+	$(RM) configure config.mak.autogen
 
 clean:
 	$(RM) *.o block-sha1/*.o ppc/*.o compat/*.o compat/*/*.o xdiff/*.o vcs-svn/*.o \
@@ -2240,7 +2240,7 @@ clean:
 	$(RM) -r $(dep_dirs)
 	$(RM) *.spec *.pyc *.pyo */*.pyc */*.pyo common-cmds.h $(ETAGS_TARGET) tags cscope*
 	$(RM) -r autom4te.cache
-	$(RM) config.log config.mak.autogen config.mak.append config.status config.cache
+	$(RM) config.log config.mak.append config.status config.cache
 	$(RM) -r $(GIT_TARNAME) .doc-tmp-dir
 	$(RM) $(GIT_TARNAME).tar.gz git-core_$(GIT_VERSION)-*.tar.gz
 	$(RM) $(htmldocs).tar.gz $(manpages).tar.gz

```

## Junio C Hamano, 2010-11-08 18:54

Subject: Re: 'Unable to find remote helper'
Message-ID: <7vzktjprwt.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/7vzktjprwt.fsf%40alter.siamese.dyndns.org
In-Reply-To: <20101104224010.GA18693@burratino>

```
Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com> writes:

> The "gmake clean" undoes the effect of "./configure".
>
> Hope that helps.
>
> Signed-off-by: Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>

You diagnosed the problem correctly, but I do not think the patch is
correct.  Why should the generated file *.autogen be kept around across
"clean"?

I do understand why we keep "configure" around (it is common for everybody
once it is generated), though.

> ---
> diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
> index d3dcfb1..c693652 100644
> --- a/Makefile
> +++ b/Makefile
> @@ -2229,7 +2229,7 @@ dist-doc:
>  ### Cleaning rules
>  
>  distclean: clean
> -	$(RM) configure
> +	$(RM) configure config.mak.autogen
>  
>  clean:
>  	$(RM) *.o block-sha1/*.o ppc/*.o compat/*.o compat/*/*.o xdiff/*.o vcs-svn/*.o \
> @@ -2240,7 +2240,7 @@ clean:
>  	$(RM) -r $(dep_dirs)
>  	$(RM) *.spec *.pyc *.pyo */*.pyc */*.pyo common-cmds.h $(ETAGS_TARGET) tags cscope*
>  	$(RM) -r autom4te.cache
> -	$(RM) config.log config.mak.autogen config.mak.append config.status config.cache
> +	$(RM) config.log config.mak.append config.status config.cache
>  	$(RM) -r $(GIT_TARNAME) .doc-tmp-dir
>  	$(RM) $(GIT_TARNAME).tar.gz git-core_$(GIT_VERSION)-*.tar.gz
>  	$(RM) $(htmldocs).tar.gz $(manpages).tar.gz

```

## Jonathan Nieder, 2010-11-08 19:37

Subject: Re: 'Unable to find remote helper'
Message-ID: <20101108193727.GA6348@burratino>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/20101108193727.GA6348%40burratino
In-Reply-To: <7vzktjprwt.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org>

```
Junio C Hamano wrote:

> You diagnosed the problem correctly, but I do not think the patch is
> correct.  Why should the generated file *.autogen be kept around across
> "clean"?

Fair enough.  The thought was that most autoconfiscated packages
support

	./configure
	make clean
	make
	make install

since "make clean" does not remove the generated Makefile.  But the
patch was incomplete anyway, since it did not keep config.mak.append
around.

> I do understand why we keep "configure" around (it is common for everybody
> once it is generated), though.

Hmm, isn't the usual scheme something like

 - "make clean" undoes the effect of "make"
 - "make distclean" removes all generated files that are not common
   to everyone
 - "make maintainer-clean" removes all generated files

?

```