On Mon, Aug 24, 2015 at 12:11:13PM -0400, Aaron Dufour wrote: > I use git (2.2.1) on OS X (10.9.5) and recently my repo got into a bad > state. I think this involves a mis-handling of case-insensitive file > systems. > > This reproduces the problem: > > > git init > Initialized empty Git repository in /Users/aarond_local/code/git-test/.git/ > > git commit --allow-empty -m 'first commit' > [master (root-commit) 923d8b8] first commit > > git checkout -b feature > Switched to a new branch 'feature' > > git checkout -b Feature > fatal: A branch named 'Feature' already exists. > > git checkout -B Feature > Switched to and reset branch 'Feature' > > git branch -d feature > Deleted branch feature (was 923d8b8). > > git log > fatal: bad default revision 'HEAD' I don't work on a case-insensitive filesystem, so my knowledge may be out of date, but as far as I know, we do not do anything special to handle ref case-sensitivity. I expect your problem would go away with this patch: diff --git a/builtin/branch.c b/builtin/branch.c index 58aa84f..c5545de 100644 --- a/builtin/branch.c +++ b/builtin/branch.c @@ -19,6 +19,7 @@ #include "column.h" #include "utf8.h" #include "wt-status.h" +#include "dir.h" static const char * const builtin_branch_usage[] = { N_("git branch [<options>] [-r | -a] [--merged | --no-merged]"), @@ -223,7 +224,7 @@ static int delete_branches(int argc, const char **argv, int force, int kinds, int flags = 0; strbuf_branchname(&bname, argv[i]); - if (kinds == REF_LOCAL_BRANCH && !strcmp(head, bname.buf)) { + if (kinds == REF_LOCAL_BRANCH && !strcmp_icase(head, bname.buf)) { error(_("Cannot delete the branch '%s' " "which you are currently on."), bname.buf); ret = 1; but I think that is just the tip of the iceberg. E.g. (on a vfat filesystem I just created): $ git init $ git commit -q --allow-empty -m one $ git branch foo $ git branch FOO fatal: A branch named 'FOO' already exists. $ git pack-refs --all --prune ;# usually run as part of git-gc $ git commit -q --allow-empty -m two $ git branch FOO $ git for-each-ref --format='%(refname) %(subject)' refs/heads/FOO two refs/heads/foo one refs/heads/master two Now the patch I showed above would do the wrong thing. Running "git checkout foo; git branch -d FOO" would be rejected, even though I really do have two separate branches. It would be a much more invasive change to fix this correctly. It is probably less work overall to move to a pluggable ref system, and to design ref storage that isn't dependent on the filesystem (this work is already underway). In the meantime, I think the best advice for mixed-case branch names on a case-insensitive filesystem is: don't. -Peff -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe git" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html