b4: prep --edit-cover emits strange message about "Already Ran"

b4: prep --edit-cover emits strange message about "Already Ran"

[Dave Marquardt]

I found the message here a little confusing, and had to go code
spelunking to figure out what it might mean and how I should answer the
Y/N question.

    $ b4 prep --edit-cover
    Waiting for Emacs...
    Invoking git-filter-repo to update the cover letter.
    The previous run is older than a day (/home/davemarq/linux/linux/.git/worktrees/ibmvfc-fpin-bis/filter-repo/already_ran already exists).
    See "Already Ran" section in the manual for more information.
    Treat this run as a continuation of filtering in the previous run (Y/N)? n
    New history written in 612.22 seconds...
    Completely finished after 612.53 seconds.
    Cover letter updated.

I first searched the b4 manual, and found nothing about "Already Ran".
Eventually, on reading the b4 code in ez.py, I found this was from the
git-filter-repo package and I should check its manual. I found the code.
There's no way to opt out of this check and message.

Would you be interested in updating the b4 manual with a note about
this? I eventually figured out I should answer with N. Perhaps an update
to the --edit-cover text in "Prep command flags" in the manual? I'll
provide it if you're interested.

-Dave

Re: b4: prep --edit-cover emits strange message about "Already Ran"

[Matthieu Baerts]

Hi Dave,

On 20/03/2026 15:41, Dave Marquardt wrote:
> I found the message here a little confusing, and had to go code
> spelunking to figure out what it might mean and how I should answer the
> Y/N question.
> 
>     $ b4 prep --edit-cover
>     Waiting for Emacs...
>     Invoking git-filter-repo to update the cover letter.
>     The previous run is older than a day (/home/davemarq/linux/linux/.git/worktrees/ibmvfc-fpin-bis/filter-repo/already_ran already exists).
>     See "Already Ran" section in the manual for more information.
>     Treat this run as a continuation of filtering in the previous run (Y/N)? n
>     New history written in 612.22 seconds...
>     Completely finished after 612.53 seconds.
>     Cover letter updated.
> 
> I first searched the b4 manual, and found nothing about "Already Ran".
> Eventually, on reading the b4 code in ez.py, I found this was from the
> git-filter-repo package and I should check its manual. I found the code.
> There's no way to opt out of this check and message.

Yes, there is: simply by removing the file. That's what b4 is doing for
a while, and it has been backported in the last stable version (0.14.3):


https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/utils/b4/b4.git/commit/?h=stable-0.14.y&id=e5369681808b

Is it not working on your side? If no, which b4 version are you using?

Cheers,
Matt
-- 
Sponsored by the NGI0 Core fund.

Re: b4: prep --edit-cover emits strange message about "Already Ran"

[Dave Marquardt]

Matthieu Baerts <matttbe@kernel.org> writes:

> On 20/03/2026 15:41, Dave Marquardt wrote:
>> I found the message here a little confusing, and had to go code
>> spelunking to figure out what it might mean and how I should answer the
>> Y/N question.
>> 
>>     $ b4 prep --edit-cover
>>     Waiting for Emacs...
>>     Invoking git-filter-repo to update the cover letter.
>>     The previous run is older than a day (/home/davemarq/linux/linux/.git/worktrees/ibmvfc-fpin-bis/filter-repo/already_ran already exists).
>>     See "Already Ran" section in the manual for more information.
>>     Treat this run as a continuation of filtering in the previous run (Y/N)? n
>>     New history written in 612.22 seconds...
>>     Completely finished after 612.53 seconds.
>>     Cover letter updated.
>> 
>> I first searched the b4 manual, and found nothing about "Already Ran".
>> Eventually, on reading the b4 code in ez.py, I found this was from the
>> git-filter-repo package and I should check its manual. I found the code.
>> There's no way to opt out of this check and message.
>
> Yes, there is: simply by removing the file. That's what b4 is doing for
> a while, and it has been backported in the last stable version (0.14.3):
>
>
> https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/utils/b4/b4.git/commit/?h=stable-0.14.y&id=e5369681808b
>
> Is it not working on your side? If no, which b4 version are you using?

Yeah, this is weird. I'm running 0.15-dev, which is some snapshot of the
master. I just looked at the code that invokes RepoFilter, and here's
the code:

            frargs = fr.FilteringOptions.parse_args(['--force', '--quiet', '--refs', f'{commit}~1..HEAD'])
            frargs.refs = [f'{commit}~1..HEAD']
            frf = fr.RepoFilter(frargs, commit_callback=fred.callback)

So --force is what should remove the file, and for some reason its not
working.

I'll debug at my end to see if I've found a bug.

Thanks!

-Dave

Re: b4: prep --edit-cover emits strange message about "Already Ran"

[Dave Marquardt]

Matthieu Baerts <matttbe@kernel.org> writes:

> Hi Dave,
>
> On 20/03/2026 15:41, Dave Marquardt wrote:
>> I found the message here a little confusing, and had to go code
>> spelunking to figure out what it might mean and how I should answer the
>> Y/N question.
>> 
>>     $ b4 prep --edit-cover
>>     Waiting for Emacs...
>>     Invoking git-filter-repo to update the cover letter.
>>     The previous run is older than a day (/home/davemarq/linux/linux/.git/worktrees/ibmvfc-fpin-bis/filter-repo/already_ran already exists).
>>     See "Already Ran" section in the manual for more information.
>>     Treat this run as a continuation of filtering in the previous run (Y/N)? n
>>     New history written in 612.22 seconds...
>>     Completely finished after 612.53 seconds.
>>     Cover letter updated.
>> 
>> I first searched the b4 manual, and found nothing about "Already Ran".
>> Eventually, on reading the b4 code in ez.py, I found this was from the
>> git-filter-repo package and I should check its manual. I found the code.
>> There's no way to opt out of this check and message.
>
> Yes, there is: simply by removing the file. That's what b4 is doing for
> a while, and it has been backported in the last stable version (0.14.3):
>
>
> https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/utils/b4/b4.git/commit/?h=stable-0.14.y&id=e5369681808b
>
> Is it not working on your side? If no, which b4 version are you using?

Okay, I have this code in my local version, and I think I know why it is
not working. This code uses

    gtl = b4.git_get_toplevel()

and b4.git_get_toplevel() uses

    gitargs = ['rev-parse', '--show-toplevel']
    lines = git_get_command_lines(path, gitargs)

But git-filter-repo uses

      git_dir = GitUtils.determine_git_dir(b'.')

and that is

    d = subproc.check_output('git rev-parse --git-dir'.split(),
                             cwd=repo_working_dir).strip()

Since I'm using a Git worktree, "git rev-parse --show-toplevel" and "git
rev-parse --git-dir" return different values:

    $ git rev-parse --show-toplevel
    /home/davemarq/linux/ibmvfc-fpin-bis
    $ git rev-parse --git-dir
    /home/davemarq/linux/linux/.git/worktrees/ibmvfc-fpin-bis

So the b4 code is looking in the wrong place.

I'll send a patch for this.

-Dave