Git mergetool generates unwanted .orig files

Question

When I do a merge conflict resolution with Kdiff3 (and other merge tool I tried) I noticed that on resolution a *.orig file is created. Is there a way for it to not create that extra file?

Danell

Finally I googled this damn thing. Thank you for asking this question 🏆 – Fiasco

Answer 1

A possible solution from git config:

git config --global mergetool.keepBackup false

After performing a merge, the original file with conflict markers can be saved as a file with a .orig extension.
If this variable is set to false then this file is not preserved.
Defaults to true (i.e. keep the backup files).

The alternative being not adding or ignoring those files, as suggested in this gitguru article,

git mergetool saves the merge-conflict version of the file with a “.orig” suffix.
Make sure to delete it before adding and committing the merge or add *.orig to your .gitignore.

Berik suggests in the comments to use:

find . -name \*.orig 
find . -name \*.orig -delete

Charles Bailey advises in his answer to be aware of internal diff tool settings which could also generate those backup files, no matter what git settings are.

• kdiff3 has its own settings (see "Directory merge" in its manual).
• other tools like WinMerge can have their own backup file extension (WinMerge: .bak, as mentioned in its manual).

So you need to reset those settings as well.

Photochemistry

Editing the settings in kdiff itself worked for me: Settings > Configure Kdiff3 > Directory. Uncheck the box labeled "Backup files (.orig)" – Stoker

git config --global mergetool.keepBackup false, Solved for P4Merge on Mavericks 10.9.2. Thanks :) – Interlocutor

found a set of .gitignore for opendiff generated files in here. may be useful for someone ;) – Alliteration

@Alliteration Interesting. That should be added or referenced in github.com/github/gitignore or gitignore.io – Photochemistry

just want to note that this works for me using 'meld' as well. – Trueblue

Note that if you're manually editing your .gitconfig, you want the keepBackup = false under [mergetool], not under [mergetool "BeyondCompare4"] or whatever visual merge tool you have configured. – Loria

git config --global mergetool.keepBackup false, solved for DiffMerge the problem too! Many thanks! It was so useful – Mulkey

You may want to use find . -name \*.orig to find these files and find . -name \*.orig -delete to delete them – Wear

I have been using git clean -f to remove unwanted .orig files. This may be a simpler move, but is probably an indicator of how little I know about git. – Sadducee

rm ./**/*.orig is a shorter alternative to the find command. – Nunes

@BenjaminHammerNørgaard True. But I always prefer to find (list files) first, check that what I am about to delete is indeed what I want, then delete it. Using rm with wildcards (* or **) is anxiety-inducing for me ;) – Photochemistry

@Photochemistry but if you are in a git repo it's not that hard to undo a mistake. Just don't forget the .. Wouldn't be too good to do rm /**/*.orig. – Nunes

Answer 2

You have to be a little careful with using kdiff3 as while git mergetool can be configured to save a .orig file during merging, the default behaviour for kdiff3 is to also save a .orig backup file independently of git mergetool.

You have to make sure that mergetool backup is off:

git config --global mergetool.keepBackup false

and also that kdiff3's settings are set to not create a backup:

Configure/Options => Directory Merge => Backup Files (*.orig)

Inclinometer

Configure/Options => Directory Merge => Backup Files (*.orig) really helped get rid of all the strange io-slave, klauncher «» unknown protocol, and couldn't create .orig errors. thank you – Glenn

Why does git config --global mergetool.keepBackup false have to be set? – Glenn

let me fix your first line "You have to be a little crazy to use kdiff3" - there :-) – Bandler

@TimJarvis I use kdiff3 all the time and I like it. I wonder if there is a reason for calling it "a little crazy to use kdiff3" or if that is just joking (I see the smiley face, I won't be offended either way, I'm earnestly asking) – Defamation

@QuinnWilson It was mostly just a joke - there are many better tools than kdiff3 though, if you like it you will probably absolutely love tools like p4Merge etc. – Bandler

Answer 3

The option to save the .orig file can be disabled by configuring KDiff3

Eruct

This should be the real solution. – Tuscany

Works for me. Thank you so much @richard-pierre – Swabber

I already had the global git config set properly but still had those .orig files on rebase/merge etc. The Kdiff3 settings finally did the trick. – Swellfish

Answer 4

To be clear, the correct git command is:

git config --global mergetool.keepBackup false

Both of the other answers have typos in the command line that will cause it to fail or not work correctly.

Steiger

Answer 5

I use this to clean up all files ending in ".orig":

function git-clean-orig {
    git status -su | grep -e"\.orig$" | cut -f2 -d" " | xargs rm -r
}

If you are a scaredy-cat :) you could leave the last part off just to list them (or leave off the -r if you want to approve each delete):

function git-show-orig {
    git status -su | grep -e"\.orig$" | cut -f2 -d" "
}

Rhineland

Totally useful if you still want the backups until you get ready to commit. – Moir

You could also add *.orig in .gitignore on the top level if you keep merge backups around. – Overscrupulous

Answer 6

I simply use the command

git clean -n *.orig

check to make sure only file I want remove are listed then

git clean -f *.orig

Trundle

A good tip! It would be good if you also added the other answers regarding gitconfig settings (from other answers). – Pekin

Answer 7

Besides the correct answers offered as long term solutions, you can use git to remove all unnecessary files once for you with the git clean -f command but use git clean --dry-run first to ensure nothing unintended would happen.

This has the benefit of using tested built in functionality of Git over scripts specific to your OS/shell to remove the files.

Numeration

Yes, but be very careful as this command does a lot more than remove the .orig files. – Rhineland

Answer 8

Or just add

*.orig

to your global gitignore

Oiler

Not a huge fan because it still leaves garbage in your local repository. – Derwin

Answer 9

git config --global mergetool.keepBackup false

This should work for Beyond Compare (as mergetool) too

Boatbill

Answer 10

If you're working on a Windows machine - you can turn off backups with this command

git config --global mergetool.keepBackup false

If you don't want to do that, you can easily delete all the .orig files using this powershell command

ls -Recurse C:\path\to\repository\*.orig | rm

Derwin

Answer 11

Windows:

1. in File Win/Users/HOME/.gitconfig set mergetool.keepTemporaries=false
2. in File git/libexec/git-core/git-mergetool, in the function cleanup_temp_files() add rm -rf -- "$MERGED.orig" within the else block.

Seigneur

See the accepted answer. This modifies core tools and is not scalable. – Yak