Re: Unable to checkout a branch after cloning

[Michael J Gruber <git@drmicha.warpmail.net>]

Matthew Lear venit, vidit, dixit 11.08.2009 16:24:
> Michael J Gruber wrote:
>> Matthew Lear venit, vidit, dixit 11.08.2009 14:17:
>>> Hi Michael - thanks for your reply.
>>> Michael J Gruber wrote:
>>>> Matthew Lear venit, vidit, dixit 11.08.2009 12:10:
>>>>> Hi all,
>>>>>
>>>>> Apologies for perhaps a silly question, but I'd very much appreciate a
>>>>> little bit of assistance.
>>>>>
>>>>> I've set up a git repository on a machine accessible from the internet
>>>>> with the intention to share code with another developer. We clone the
>>>>> repository, commit changes then push back as you'd expect. The server
>>>>> runs gitweb for repository browsing. Clients are running git v1.6.0.6.
>>>>>
>>>>> When I created the initial repository I also created two additional
>>>>> branches - 'upstream' and 'custom'. The former is to act as a 'vendor
>>>>> branch' and the latter contains code specific to the custom platform
>>>>> that we're working on. The master branch contains merges from the
>>>>> upstream branch and also changes that we've made. The custom branch
>>>>> contains merges from master with custom platform specific changes.
>>>>>
>>>>> I've committed changes and on both upstream and custom branches as work
>>>>> progressed, merged them where appropriate, added tags etc and pushed
>>>>> everything to the remote repository. No problem. I can view the
>>>>> branches, tags etc in gitweb and everything looks fine.
>>>>>
>>>>> However, I can clone a new repository just fine but I'm unable to
>>>>> checkout the upstream or custom branches. After cloning, only the master
>>>>> branch is available, ie:
>>>>>
>>>>>> git checkout upstream
>>>>> error: pathspec 'upstream' did not match any file(s) known to git.
>>>>>
>>>>>> git branch -a
>>>>> * master
>>>>>   origin/HEAD
>>>>>   origin/master
>>>>>
>>>>> .git/config:
>>>>>
>>>>> [core]
>>>>>         repositoryformatversion = 0
>>>>>         filemode = true
>>>>>         bare = false
>>>>>         logallrefupdates = true
>>>>> [remote "origin"]
>>>>>         url = https://mysite/git/project.git
>>>>>         fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
>>>>> [branch "master"]
>>>>>         remote = origin
>>>>>         merge = refs/heads/master
>>>>>
>>>>> But the initial local repository where I work (ie created the branches,
>>>>> committed changes, tag, push etc) seems to be fine, ie
>>>>>
>>>>>> git checkout upstream
>>>>> Switched to branch "upstream"
>>>>>
>>>>>> git branch -a
>>>>>   custom
>>>>> * master
>>>>>   upstream
>>>>>
>>>>> .git/config:
>>>>>
>>>>> [core]
>>>>>         repositoryformatversion = 0
>>>>>         filemode = true
>>>>>         bare = false
>>>>>         logallrefupdates = true
>>>>> [remote "origin"]
>>>>>         url = https://mysite/git/project.git
>>>>>         fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Developers need to be able to clone the repository and then switch to
>>>>> the appropriate branch in order to work. However it seems that after a
>>>>> clone, only the master branch is available.
>>>>>
>>>>> Why is this?
>>>>>
>>>>> Any help would be much appreciated indeed.
>>>> If I understand you correctly you have 3 repos: the "initial" one on
>>>> which everything is as expected, the "server" one and the "new clone"
>>>> which is missing branches.
>>> Yes, that's correct.
>>>
>>>> Now: How's the server one doing, i.e. what does "git ls-remote
>>>> https://mysite/git/project.git" say? I suspect that one either does not
>>>> have the branches (you haven't told us how you pushed) or in the wrong
>>>> place (remotes/).
>>>> git ls-remote https://mysite/git/project.git
>>> 065f5f13d5f8e786729db1623cc53767c963e959        HEAD
>>> 065f5f13d5f8e786729db1623cc53767c963e959        refs/heads/master
>>>
>>> Hmm. So it seems that the branches are not actually on the server
>>> repository. So how come I can see them with gitweb..?
>>>
>>> I've been pushing from the 'initial' repository with git push --all and
>>> git push --tags.
>>>
>>> However, when I try a git push from the initial repository I get the
>>> following:
>>>
>>>> git push --all
>>> Fetching remote heads...
>>>   refs/
>>>   refs/heads/
>>>   refs/tags/
>>> 'refs/heads/custom': up-to-date
>>> 'refs/heads/master': up-to-date
>>> 'refs/heads/upstream': up-to-date
>>>
>>> -- Matt
>>
>> Does the situation improve if, on the server, you run git
>> update-server-info? Do you have a post-update hook there?
>>
>> Michael
> 
> I ran git update-server-info on the server machine. I read about this
> and thought I had made the necessary change to add it as a post commit
> hook. I guess not (so will double check). However, something is still
> not quite right upon cloning:
> 
>> git clone https://mysite/git/project.git
> Initialized empty Git repository in /home/matt/git-repos/project/.git/
> Checking out files: 100% (26747/26747), done.
> 
>> git branch -a
> * master
>   origin/HEAD
>   origin/custom
>   origin/master
>   origin/upstream

We're making progress, that's good ;)
Re. the hook: Make sure it's executable and the extension .sample is
removed.

(gitweb and http access are two different things, which is a common
source of confusion)

> 
>> git checkout upstream
> error: pathspec 'upstream' did not match any file(s) known to git.
> 
> So it seems that the cloned repository is now aware of the branches
> (improvement) but I'm still unable to switch to a branch.
> 
> This is probably now a case of me reading the manual but I'd appreciate
> your thoughts nonetheless.

Well, there is no branch names upstream. There's only one named
origin/upstream, and it's a remote branch. Meaning: checking it out will
produce a detached head, which may or may not be what you want. If you
want to create a branch to work on upstream, do something like

git checkout -b myupstream origin/upstream

(git does something like git checkout -b master origin/master
automatically when cloning, which I think is a common source of confusion)

> Thanks for your continued feedback,
> --  Matt

Cheers,
Michael