git pull fails 'error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!'

Question

git pull is giving this error:

$ git pull
error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!
error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!
error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!
error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!
Current branch mybranch is up to date.

I have tried this solution but it doesn't work for me. Updated info:

$ GIT_TRACE=1 git pull 
trace: exec: 'git-pull'
trace: run_command: 'git-pull'
trace: built-in: git 'rev-parse' '--git-dir'
trace: built-in: git 'rev-parse' '--is-bare-repository'
trace: built-in: git 'rev-parse' '--show-toplevel'
trace: built-in: git 'ls-files' '-u'
trace: built-in: git 'symbolic-ref' '-q' 'HEAD'
trace: built-in: git 'config' '--bool' 'branch.mybranch.rebase'
trace: built-in: git 'rev-parse' '-q' '--verify' 'HEAD'
trace: built-in: git 'rev-parse' '--verify' 'HEAD'
trace: built-in: git 'update-index' '-q' '--ignore-submodules' '--refresh'
trace: built-in: git 'diff-files' '--quiet' '--ignore-submodules'
trace: built-in: git 'diff-index' '--cached' '--quiet' '--ignore-submodules' 'HEAD' '--'
trace: built-in: git 'rev-parse' '-q' '--git-dir'
trace: built-in: git 'rev-parse' '-q' '--verify' 'refs/remotes/origin/mybranch'
trace: built-in: git 'merge-base' '53512e9ce3faa7c78b6d5d7ba1a63e56b5a42a11' 'refs/heads/mybranch'
trace: built-in: git 'rev-parse' '-q' '--verify' 'HEAD'
trace: built-in: git 'fetch' '--update-head-ok'
error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!
trace: run_command: 'ssh' 'git@git-master' 'git-upload-pack '\''function-test'\'''
error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!
trace: run_command: 'rev-list' '--verify-objects' '--stdin' '--not' '--all' '--quiet'
trace: run_command: 'rev-list' '--verify-objects' '--stdin' '--not' '--all'
trace: exec: 'git' 'rev-list' '--verify-objects' '--stdin' '--not' '--all'
trace: built-in: git 'rev-list' '--verify-objects' '--stdin' '--not' '--all'
error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!
error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!
trace:...

Not sure if this will help. But try `git remote prune origin` — usha, Dec 18 '13 at 16:49
please do `$ GIT_TRACE=1 git pull` and update your question with the actual refspec being used to call `git fetch` (the first thing `git pull` does). — kostix, Dec 18 '13 at 17:26
@Vimsha: ```$ git remote prune origin``` returns ```error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!``` — Jaime M., Dec 19 '13 at 09:35

score 52 · Answer 1 · answered Dec 20 '13 at 09:16

52

The simplest thing would be to completely remove your stash. Note that you’ll need to remove two files - not one file, as outlined in the linked solution:

rm .git/refs/stash .git/logs/refs/stash

answered Dec 20 '13 at 09:16

mockinterface

14,452
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rm .git/refs/... works to me, thank you @mockinterface. – monteirobrena Apr 07 '14 at 21:06
1

had to run `git stash` after that and errors vanished – Dmitry Gryazin Sep 17 '15 at 13:41
I ended up doing a text search through my entire .git directory and removing all references. – Cordell Nov 15 '17 at 22:18
I'm on Windows with git-gui 0.21 and when I went to menu Repository -> Visualize master's history, it showed the error, but I did this and the message it's gone, hope will nevershow again – tttony Aug 10 '20 at 00:12

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 22 '17 at 02:12

I just ran into this error. Two servers were pulling a clone from the same source; only one of them gave this error. So I dug deeper.

Git's release notes for version 1.8.5.5 state:

"git clone" would fail to clone from a repository that has a ref directly under "refs/", e.g. "refs/stash", because different validation paths do different things on such a refname. Loosen the client side's validation to allow such a ref.

I found that one of the servers was using Git 1.7.1 and the other was using Git 1.8.5.6.

It's worth noting that the fetch command would fail as well, though not explicitly mentioned in the release notes above.

In my particular case I also found that the server with Git 1.7.1 actually had the later Git as well, but it was later in the PATH environment variable.

It may be of interest that when I ran git fetch using the later version, the clone thereafter worked even with the older version.

The simplest solution is just to upgrade Git to version 1.8.5.5 or later.

_{Or, of course, drop the stash, but then your clone will break again next time someone makes a stash.}

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Aug 28 '22 at 21:00

I tried all of the recommended solutions, but nothing fixed it. What fixed it for me at the end was pretty simple:

# Made a small change in a code-file with vim

# stash'ed it then
git stash

# got it back
git stash pop

# reverted my small change
git checkout .

# finish, no more error
git pull

That might not work for everyone, and it might not work without following other fixes made earlier in here. But its worth a try.

score 0 · Answer 4 · answered Jul 09 '21 at 11:29

I faced a similar issue but while doing go build or go mod tidy or go run. All the commands were giving me the same errors,

'error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!'

I tried many things as below.

git remote prune origin
git stash
rm .git/refs/stash .git/logs/refs/stash

Nothing worked for me. Finally, I deleted all the cache present in my system under path $GOPATH/go/pkg/mod/cache/, and I was able to resolve the issues.

git pull fails 'error: refs/stash does not point to a valid object!'

4 Answers4

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