Git and nasty "error: cannot lock existing info/refs fatal"

Question

After cloning from remote git repository (at bettercodes) I made some changes, commited and tried to push:

git push origin master

Errors with:

error: cannot lock existing info/refs
fatal: git-http-push failed

This case regards already existing repository.

What I did before, was:

1. git config --global http.sslVerify false
2. git init
3. git remote add [url]
4. git clone
5. change data
6. git commit

At 'bettercodes' I have no access to git log.

I'm using Windows. The detailed error was:

C:\MyWorkStuff\Projects\Ruby\MyProject\>git push origin master
Unable to create branch path https://user:[email protected]/myproject/info/
error: cannot lock existing info/refs
fatal: git-http-push failed

I cloned before, then changed the code and committed.

Litch

Two possible reasons: a) Another instance of git is running (kill all git processes or reboot) b) .git folder was created as Administrator (try administrator command line for the operation) – Tickle

For me, I resolved the error by calling git fetch before git pull. – Top

In my case the problem was the cases of the directory name. The branch name was "origin/no-ticket", but in my local dir the name was NO-TICKET so I just renamed it and it worked. – Raymonraymond

Answer 1

For me this worked (won't change in remote):

git remote prune origin

Since this answer seems to help a lot of people, I dug a little bit into what actually happens here. What this will do is remove references to remote branches in the folder .git/refs/remotes/origin.

So this will not affect your local branches and it will not change anything remote, but it will update the local references you have to remote branches. It seems in some cases these references can contain data Git cannot handle correctly.

Baneful

I've added some background info, but I must honestly say I don't know exactly why and how this works :) – Baneful

git remote prune origin work for me. But I have delete all the reference in .git/refs/remotes/origin. – Hydrology

This is exactly what git suggests doing, but I was reluctant to do it because the command sounds like it does something to the remote. – Treatment

I ran git gc --prune=now – Joris

I was getting similar error for "git fetch" . git remote prune origin fixed it. – Hydrostat

How is this different to git remote update origine --prune? (for git 2.23.0) – Doublepark

This is the SCARIEST git cmd I have run in a while. (PS: it worked) – Robertroberta

Not sure if this makes it any less confusing, but: "git remote prune <branchname> # update local/remote sync" (gist.github.com/cferdinandi/ef665330286fd5d7127d) – Gametocyte

Also git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Working-with-Remotes – Gametocyte

If you still don't believe this is harmless, which I didn't, you can run git remote prune origin --dry-run first. This answer solved it for me. – Mitochondrion

This same symptom may also be seen during transient race conditions among concurrent git push commands. In this case, a simple retry of the git push might be sufficient. See related discussion at git.661346.n2.nabble.com/Git-push-race-condition-td7606412.html and concurrency background at https://mcmap.net/q/55416/-locking-strategy-of-git-to-achieve-concurrency git locking mechanism to ensure concurrency – Haversine

eh, didn't work for me. I can't create new branches :( – Museology

This worked for me, but I could not push a new branch (git push --set-upstream origin branch_name) until after I ran git fetch --all – Obsessive

git pull --prune will do the same but with a less scary command. – Ayurveda

git pull --prune worked for me after git remote prune origin somehow did not fully resolve the issue. – Annieannihilate

that doesn't help me, still see fatal: cannot lock ref. – Untried

Is there any way we can say git to ignore such errors. In my repo, we have reached to a point where there are 100s of active branches and we get this error every time we try to fetch. Git should really provide a way to handle what to do... and there really should be a way to IGNORE it for one or two branches. – Loki

Answer 2

You want to try doing:

git gc --prune=now

See https://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/git-gc.html

Acarus

Is --prune=now the same as --prune=all? If so, the documentation warns that you may lose unanchored objects. If there are unanchored objects you should probably try to reconcile them before pruning. – Karolkarola

Life saver, thank you. git pull was stuck with the similar error message. – Forerunner

It helped for "git error:cannot lock ref" exception on fetch. Thanks a lot! – Literate

This worked for me. But then I had to keep executing the same command each time I use a git command that deals with remote. git remote prune origin resolved the issue once and for all. – Brown

fwiw: git gc: Runs a number of housekeeping tasks within the current repository, such as compressing file revisions... removing unreachable objects which may have been created from prior invocations of git add, packing refs, pruning reflog, rerere metadata or stale working trees... AND prune: Prune loose objects older than date (default is 2 weeks ago, overridable by the config variable gc.pruneExpire). --prune=now prunes loose objects regardless of their age and increases the risk of corruption if another process is writing to the repository concurrently... --prune is on by default. – Alderson

You made my day. Thanks a lot. But, I have to execute this command every time when I switch the branch. Does any generic solution work for all the branches? That will be a great help. Thanks again. – Racemic

this git cmd looks scary but it works like charm. Thanks. – Exobiology

For me, git remote prune origin didn't work but git gc --prune=now did the trick. – Gadmon

that doesn't help me, still see fatal: cannot lock ref. – Untried

What to do when I keep running into this issue? It seems whenever I pull latest master, I will run into this problem again next time. – Khajeh

Answer 3

This happened to me when my git remote (bitbucket.org) changed their IP address. The quick fix was to remove and re-add the remote, then everything worked as expected. If you're not familiar with how to remove and re-add a remote in git, here are the steps:

1. Copy the SSH git URL of your existing remote. You can print it to the terminal using this command:

   git remote -v

which will print out something like this:

 origin [email protected]:account-name/repo-name.git (fetch)
 origin [email protected]:account-name/repo-name.git (push)

2. Remove the remote from your local git repo:

   git remote rm origin

3. Add the remote back to your local repo:

   git remote add origin [email protected]:account-name/repo-name.git

Wreck

I've tried everything else, like git gc, git prune, rm 'file with lock error', git update server info, etc. Only this answer worked for me. Sometimes it's like a windows reboot, reboot and it'll work. Same here, just remove and add the repo again, and everything goes fine ;) – Inoffensive

After the above procedure, I also needed to tell git to track the remote branch again with e.g.: git branch -u origin/master – Discriminant

This blew away all my remote tracking info in .git/config and didn't actually work. – Herd

This worked for me as well. All the others didn't work. – Oviform

This worked for me as well. All the others like git gc didn't work. – Dimorphous

@Herd it blew away my remote tracking too, but I regain those with git branch --set-upstream-to=origin/<branch> <local_branch> one by one – Nealy

This one definitely worked best for me. The prune stuff only worked for a few next commands, but after that the nasty problem would come back. This solution really did the trick. – Tifanie

WARNING! johnnyclem failed to warn this action will drop all your branch links to origin. You have to add them back afterwards. Thanks to @Nealy and fotinsky for adding the information. Note you may also need to run git fetch first to get the remote branches that you want to add back. WARNING! johnnyclem - it would be great if you could complete your answer. – Blackball

I think you can reconnect all of the upstreams at once with git remote update – Softfinned

This is the most viable solution for me also. git update-ref -d refs/remotes/origin/path/to/branch also works but you'd need to apply it to each individual ref that is an issue. – Nootka

Answer 4

This is what I did to get rid of all the lock ref issues:

git gc --prune=now
git remote prune origin

This is probably what you only need to do too.

More about git gc command here: https://git-scm.com/docs/git-gc

More about git remote prune here: https://git-scm.com/docs/git-remote#Documentation/git-remote.txt-empruneem

Halloo

This one did it for me, thanks! – Brazilein

Answer 5

Running command git update-ref -d refs/heads/origin/branch fixed it.

Theotokos

That command did the trick for me as well, although my remote branch ref was slightly different: git update-ref -d refs/remotes/origin/my_branch – Casino

This worked for me, it appears this was a case sensitivity issue. There were two branches with the same name that were pushed to origin by another git user, one had all lower case and one that was title case. – Empson

This fixed it... Caused by 2 branches with same name different cases. – Grenade

Answer 6

What worked for me was:

1. Remove .git/logs/refs/remotes/origin/branch
2. Remove .git/refs/remotes/origin/branch
3. Run git gc --prune=now

More about git gc command here: https://git-scm.com/docs/git-gc

Paulson

Worked like a charm. If anyone is facing issue with the file/folder name branch then it is actually referring to all the branch name files/folders. I hope this helps! – Hyacinthe

It'll be great if you add documentation links too. like for gc command – Fencesitter

I mean, I do this, same error. – Amerce

Answer 7

I fixed this by doing the following

git branch --unset-upstream
rm .git/refs/remotes/origin/{branch}
git gc --prune=now
git branch --set-upstream-to=origin/{branch} {branch}
#or git push --set-upstream origin {branch}
git pull

This assuming that your local and remote branches are aligned and you are just getting the refs error as non fatal.

Resolute

Answer 8

Before pull you need to clean your local changes. following command help me to solve.

git remote prune origin

and then after

git pull origin develop

Hopes this helps!

Antiparallel

it doesn't solve the issue for me. Still get the same error – Abridge

@AfonsoSchulzAlbrecht I needed to do the solution https://mcmap.net/q/53968/-git-and-nasty-quot-error-cannot-lock-existing-info-refs-fatal-quot provided by emirc – Buckjump

I still had an issue pulling after the prune commands in other answers. git pull origin develop fixed an (unable to update local ref) error for me, thanks! – Canton

Answer 9

As a reference for Visual Studio Code (vscode, code) (and possibly other IDEs)

I had to do command: Git: Fetch (Prune)

Command line alternative should be: git fetch --prune

Then restart the whole IDE.

And to give some perspective I will quote BitBucket's docs:

What’s the Difference Between Git Prune,
Git Fetch --prune, and Git Remote Prune?

git remote prune and git fetch --prune do the same thing: delete the refs to branches that don't exist on the remote. This is highly desirable when working in a team workflow in which remote branches are deleted after merge to main. The second command, git fetch --prune will connect to the remote and fetch the latest remote state before pruning. It is essentially a combination of commands:
git fetch --all && git remote prune
The generic git prune command is entirely different. As discussed in the overview section, git prune will delete locally detached commits.

Spreadeagle

Answer 10

I had this issue because I was on a branch that had a similar name to an upstream branch. i.e. the upstream branch was called example-branch and my local branch was called example-branch/backend. The solution was changing the name of my local branch like so:

git branch -m <new name goes here>

Mentality

Had a similar problem. Had an upstream branch "questlines/layout" and a local branch "questlines" (Using Gitkraken). Just renamed "questlines" to "questlines/bugfix" and it worked as it did before. – Tunis

This solution was the first that worked for me. Had many similar branch names. Created a new branch with an entirely different name and it worked. git remote prune didn't work for me. Thank you! – Outoftheway

Answer 11

This is probably resolved by now. But here is what worked for me.

1. Location:

   • If locked repository is on the server-side:

     1. ssh to your git repository on the server.
     2. Login as user which has permissions to modify the repository and navigate to the repository on your server.

   • If locked repository is local only:

     1. Open the git console and navigate to the repository directory.

     2. Run this command:

        git update-server-info
        

2. Fix the permissions on your (remote or/and local) repository if you have to. In my case I had to chmod to 777 and chown to apache:apache

3. Try to push again from the local repository:

   git push
   

Virilism

Answer 12

This sounds like a permissions issue - is it possible you had two windows open, executing with separate rights? Perhaps check ownership of the .git folder.

Perhaps check to see if there is an outstanding file lock open, maybe use lsof to check, or the equivalent for your OS.

Copulative

Answer 13

This is how it works for me.

1. look up the Apache DAV lock file on your server (e.g. /var/lock/apache2/DAVlock)
2. delete it
3. recreate it with write permissions for the webserver
4. restart the webserver

Even faster alternative:

1. look up the Apache DAV lock file on your server (e.g. /var/lock/apache2/DAVlock)
2. Empty the file: cat /dev/null > /var/lock/apache2/DAVlock
3. restart the webserver

Onanism

This was my issue. Thanks for the post. I ran the remove and permissions all in one shot. #> rm DAVLock; touch DAVLock; chown www-data.www-data DAVLock; chmod 755 DAVLock; service apache2 restart – Karolinekaroly

Answer 14

In my case a branch was moved to a subdirectory and the directory was called as the branch. Git was confused by that. When I deleted the local branch (in SourceTree just with right click delete) everything worked as usual.

Reset

Answer 15

Update:

You might need to edit your ~/.netrc file:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/git-core/+bug/293553

---

Original answer:

Why did you disable ssl? I think this might have to do with you not being able to push via https. I'd set it back and try to push again:

git config –global http.sslVerify true

Crag

Answer 16

In my case after getting this message I did the checkout command and was given this message:

Your branch is based on 'origin/myBranch', but the upstream is gone.
  (use "git branch --unset-upstream" to fixup)

After running this command I was back to normal.

Mogul

Answer 17

Run git fetch --all before git pull. That should solve the problem.

Bemba

Answer 18

I had a typical Mac related issue that I could not resolve with the other suggested answers.

Mac's default file system setting is that it is case insensitive.

In my case, a colleague obviously forgot to create a uppercase letter for a branch i.e.

testBranch/ID-1 vs. testbranch/ID-2

for the Mac file system (yeah, it can be configured differently) these two branches are the same and in this case, you only get one of the two folders. And for the remaining folder you get an error.

In my case, removing the sub-folder in question in .git/logs/ref/remotes/origin resolved the problem, as the branch in question has already been merged back.

Concision

I had the same problem on Windows. Someone created a second branch with the same name but different case. I had to delete one of the two branches on the git server for it to work. – Haggerty

Using mac too and removing the folder didn't fix the issue, changing the upper case in folder name (branch name before the / in the refs/remotes folder) to lower has resolved the issue for me – Joannejoannes

Answer 19

For me it was happening when I try to create a new branch with a name like this one:

master/pre-upgrade

changing it to another name like:

pre-upgrade/master

did the trick!

Some additional info on this issue

Git stores the branch information as files in a folder structure where the last string after the / is a file that contains the commit SHA# of the head of the branch.

This means that a branch called

a/b/c

will be stored in

.git/refs/heads/a/b/c

If you would try to add a branch named

a/b/c/d

git will try to store that in

.git/refs/heads/a/b/c/d 

but that wont be possible because b is a file and cant store other files in it.

I.E consider git branch names as paths because they are used as paths by git.

Valdis

Answer 20

Aside from the many answers already supplied to this question, a simple check on the local repo branches that exist in your machine and those that don't in the remote, will help. In which case you don't use the

git prune

command as many have suggested.

Simply delete the local branch

git branch -d <branch name without a remote tracking branch by the same name>

as shown in the attached screenshot using -D to force delete when you are sure that a local branch does not have a remote branch tracked.

Cavein

Answer 21

Case 1: Let check branches from git-server if they are duplicated or not.

Example: two branches below are duplicated:

    - upper_with_lower
    - UPPER_with_lower

---> Let consider removing one of them.

Case 2: The branch you are pushing are duplicated with other branch.

Embroideress

Answer 22

I got this issue when I tried to create a branch that starts with a current branch. I had a branch named develop and I tried to create a branch called develop/myFeature.

Museology

Answer 23

None of these worked for me. Some solutions would work for the first git pull afterwards, but the error would re-appear for every pull after. So here's what I did.

I edited the .git/packed-refs in my repo, and removed the line for the ref/repo that git didn't like. Then I did a fetch+pull again, and the error seems to be gone.

Amerce

Nice quick solution that worked for me. Welcome to the 2k club! – Neidaneidhardt

Answer 24

Check that you (git process actually) have access to file .git/info/refs and this file isn't locked by another process.

Foramen

How do you check that? – Ruano

Answer 25

I had this problem, when I was trying to create a new feature branch that contained name of the old branch, e.g. origin - branch1 and I wanted to create branch1-feature. It wasn't possibble, but branch1/feature was already.

Theine

Answer 26

I had the same error message, root cause was a rewrite of the history (branch renaming).

That worked for me:

git remote prune origin

Source: https://codedaily.in/git-error-cannot-lock-refs/

Intensify

Answer 27

I had a similar issue that totally confused me. I had a local branch named test and was trying to fetch and checkout remote branch named test/some-changes.

Fix was just to remove a stale test branch, and I could fetch and checkout the remote one.

Fay

Thanks!!! I wanted to push 'hotfix/something' and the remote had a branch 'hotfix'. No other solution given here worked. Removing the remote 'hotfix' did it. – Gypsie

Answer 28

It can also happen that if you are naming branch using group words like feat, bugfix, e.g., feat/awesome-feature and there already exists a branch at origin with name feat, i.e., origin/feat, your push will be rejected with error "refs/heads/feat exists; cannot create refs/heads/feat/awesome-feature".

Billionaire

Answer 29

In my case, it was connected with the branch name that I had already created.

To fix the issue I've created a branch with the name that for certain shouldn't exist, like:

git checkout -b some_unknown_branch

Then I've cleared all my other branches(not active) because they were just unnecessary garbage.

git branch | grep -v \* | grep -v master | xargs git branch -D

and then renamed my current branch with the name that I've intended, like:

git checkout -m my_desired_branch_name

Reward

Answer 30

In my case I had to manually delete old tags which had been removed on remote.

Torrietorrin

Answer 31

If you are in the fortunate position of having no local work to commit/push and time to get coffee, you could simply delete your local copy of the repo and re-clone

Concertize

Answer 32

None of the answers worked for me... so I recloned the repo, which re-created the correct refs. Last resort option, but a fast and efficient fix

Cant

Answer 33

I was getting error on

git pull

So, I tried this it worked for me

git pull origin <branch_name>
git pull origin feature/my_branch

Tetrabrach

Answer 34

In case of bettercodes.org, the solution is more poetic - the only problem may be in rights assigned to the project members. Simple members don't have write rights! Please make sure that you have the Moderator or Administrator rights. This needs to be set at bettercodes.org at the project settings by an Administrator, of course.

Olnton

Answer 35

I saw this error when trying to run git filter-branch to detach many subdirectories into a new, separate repository (as in this answer).

I tried all of the above solutions and none of them worked. Eventually, I decided I didn't need to preserve my tags all that badly in the new branch and just ran:

git remote remove origin
git tag | xargs git tag -d
git gc --prune=now
git filter-branch --index-filter 'git rm --cached -qr --ignore-unmatch -- . && git reset -q $GIT_COMMIT -- apps/AAA/ libs/xxx' --prune-empty -- --all

Drennan

Answer 36

This error was coming on doing

git fetch

but in my case I just wanted the update of the main branch which can be done using

git fetch origin main

Not a solution to lock ref problem but it helped me avoid the problem :P

Irrelevant

Answer 37

I fixed this problem by simply using git push origin -u branchName

Advise

Answer 38

Running "rm -rf .git/logs" solved my problem.

⚠️ Please note if you try this solution, all of your stashed changes would be gone.

Loutitia

Answer 39

for me, removing .git/info/ref kick things going.There shouldn't be a ref file when git is not running. But in my case there were one for whatever reason and caused the problem.

Removing the file will not remove any of your local commits or branches.

Homosporous