Re: windows: error cannot lock ref ... unable to create lock

[Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@gmx.de>]

Hi Philip,

On Sat, 22 Jun 2019, Philip Oakley wrote:

> On 18/06/2019 18:01, Eric Sunshine wrote:
> > On Tue, Jun 18, 2019 at 12:39 PM Anthony Sottile <asottile@umich.edu> wrote:
> > > + git fetch origin --tags
> > > Unpacking objects: 100% (10/10), done.
> > >  From https://github.com/asottile-archive/git-windows-branch-test
> > >   * [new branch]      master     -> origin/master
> > > error: cannot lock ref 'refs/remotes/origin/pr/aux': Unable to create
> > > 'C:/Users/IEUser/x/x/.git/refs/remotes/origin/pr/aux.lock': No such
> > > file or directory
> > >   ! [new branch]      pr/aux     -> origin/pr/aux  (unable to update local
> > >   ref)
> > AUX is a reserved[1] filename on Windows. Quoting from that source:
> >
> >      Do not use the following reserved names for the name of a file:
> >      CON, PRN, AUX, NUL, COM1, COM2, COM3, COM4, COM5, COM6, COM7,
> >      COM8, COM9, LPT1, LPT2, LPT3, LPT4, LPT5, LPT6, LPT7, LPT8, and
> >      LPT9. Also avoid these names followed immediately by an
> >      extension...
> >
> > The default Git "ref store" is filesystem-based, so a branch named
> > "aux" is problematic. Other ref store implementations would not be
> > subject to this limitation (though I'm not sure what the state of the
> > others is -- someone with more knowledge can probably answer that).
> >
> > [1]:
> > https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/desktop/FileIO/naming-a-file#naming-conventions
> This sounds interesting. I thought (but I'm not certain) that Git for Windows
> avoided creating files in the working tree with such problematic names, so
> that a clone of a repo that contained a file "AUX" (any case, any extension
> IIRC), would be bypassed with possibly a warning message.
>
> However this looks to be a slightly different case where a _branch_ called
> "AUX" (lower cased) has been created within the clone, and it's a problem not
> trapped. Maybe worth creating a proper issue on the Git-for-Windows repo. Also
> cc'ing Dscho who may remember better than I.

He doesn't ;-)

Ciao,
Dscho