pull.ff = only vs. branch.<name>.rebase = true problem

pull.ff = only vs. branch.<name>.rebase = true problem

[Herman, Geza]

Hi,

I saw a similar bug report two months ago ("pull.rebase config option 
broken in 2.33.1"), but it was only about pull.ff=only and pull.rebase. 
My issue is that if "pull.ff = only" is set, then even if 
"branch.<name>.rebase = true", the pull fails because

"fatal: Not possible to fast-forward, aborting."

But because of the branch settings, I'd expect a rebase here.

I modified the script in the previous bug report to show the issue:

--- 8< -------------

git init repo
cd repo

commit() {
     echo $1 >$1
     git add $1
     git commit -m $1
}

git checkout -b local
commit base
commit local

git checkout -b remote HEAD^
commit remote

git checkout local
git config pull.ff only
git config branch.local.rebase true
git pull . remote

--- 8< -------------

This script succeeds with previous versions of git, but with the latest 
one it fails.

My use case is this: I use "pull.ff=only" in my ~/.gitconfig to avoid 
any accidental merges throughout all my repos and branches. But, on 
branches where I do actual work, I usually rebase, so I set 
"branch.<name>.rebase = true" on these branches. Previously this worked, 
but now it has this problem.

Thanks,
Geza Herman