When we lock a reference like "foo" we need to handle the case where "foo" exists, but is an empty directory. That's what this code added in bc7127ef0f (ref locking: allow 'foo' when 'foo/bar' used to exist but not anymore., 2006-09-30) seems like it should be dealing with. Except it doesn't, and we never take this branch. The reason is that when bc7127ef0f was written this looked like: ref = resolve_ref([...]); if (!ref && errno == EISDIR) { [...] And in resolve_ref() we had this code: fd = open(path, O_RDONLY); if (fd < 0) return NULL; I.e. we would attempt to read "foo" with open(), which would fail with EISDIR and we'd return NULL. We'd then take this branch, call remove_empty_directories() and continue. Since a1c1d8170d (refs_resolve_ref_unsafe: handle d/f conflicts for writes, 2017-10-06) we don't, because our our callstack will look something like: files_copy_or_rename_ref() -> lock_ref_oid_basic() -> refs_resolve_ref_unsafe() And then the refs_resolve_ref_unsafe() call here will in turn (in the code added in a1c1d8170d) do the equivalent of this (via a call to refs_read_raw_ref()): /* Via refs_read_raw_ref() */ fd = open(path, O_RDONLY); if (fd < 0) /* get errno == EISDIR */ /* later, in refs_resolve_ref_unsafe() */ if ([...] && errno != EISDIR) return NULL; [...] /* returns the refs/heads/foo to the caller, even though it's a directory */ return refname; I.e. even though we got an "errno == EISDIR" we won't take this branch, since in cases of EISDIR "resolved" is always non-NULL. I.e. we pretend at this point as though everything's OK and there is no "foo" directory. We then proceed with the entire ref update and don't call remove_empty_directories() until we call commit_ref_update(). See 5387c0d883 (commit_ref(): if there is an empty dir in the way, delete it, 2016-05-05) for the addition of that code. Signed-off-by: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason <avarab@xxxxxxxxx> --- While working on a re-roll of the review/helping out Han-Wen with the refs backend at [1] I discovered that this codepath in lock_ref_oid_basic() has been unused for some time. In that series I added a BUG() to it[2], but it's even better to remove it entirely. I'll submit any proposed re-roll of [1] on top of this, I thought it was better to review this isolated and more easily understood change on its own. 1. https://lore.kernel.org/git/cover-00.17-00000000000-20210711T162803Z-avarab@xxxxxxxxx 2. https://lore.kernel.org/git/patch-07.17-10a40c9244e-20210711T162803Z-avarab@xxxxxxxxx/ refs/files-backend.c | 20 -------------------- 1 file changed, 20 deletions(-) diff --git a/refs/files-backend.c b/refs/files-backend.c index 677b7e4cdd..7e4963fd07 100644 --- a/refs/files-backend.c +++ b/refs/files-backend.c @@ -941,26 +941,6 @@ static struct ref_lock *lock_ref_oid_basic(struct files_ref_store *refs, resolved = !!refs_resolve_ref_unsafe(&refs->base, refname, resolve_flags, &lock->old_oid, type); - if (!resolved && errno == EISDIR) { - /* - * we are trying to lock foo but we used to - * have foo/bar which now does not exist; - * it is normal for the empty directory 'foo' - * to remain. - */ - if (remove_empty_directories(&ref_file)) { - last_errno = errno; - if (!refs_verify_refname_available( - &refs->base, - refname, extras, skip, err)) - strbuf_addf(err, "there are still refs under '%s'", - refname); - goto error_return; - } - resolved = !!refs_resolve_ref_unsafe(&refs->base, - refname, resolve_flags, - &lock->old_oid, type); - } if (!resolved) { last_errno = errno; if (last_errno != ENOTDIR || -- 2.32.0.851.g0fc62a9785