Run command git branch --set-upstream-to produce error

Question

I tried to execute command:

$ git branch --set-upstream-to master origin/master
fatal: branch 'origin/master' does not exist

I checked origin/master exists

`origin/master` is a "remote branch", and remote branches do not *have* "upstreams". Normally they *are* upstreams; normally you'd set `master` (a local branch) to have `origin/master` (remote branch) as its upstream. Is that what you meant to do? — torek, Oct 09 '14 at 15:04

score 7 · Answer 1 · edited May 23 '17 at 10:29

7

The syntax for git branch is:

git branch' (--set-upstream-to=<upstream> | -u <upstream>) [<branchname>]

In your case:

git branch --set-upstream-to=origin/master master 
# or
git branch -u origin/master master

# for git older than 1.8
git branch master --set-upstream origin/master

If you see an error like:

Error is: fatal: 
Cannot setup tracking information; starting point 'origin/master' is not a branch.

It means you haven't fetched anything from the remote origin.

Check that you do have a remote named origin, with a proper associated url
```
git remote -v
```
Try and fetch from origin
```
git fetch origin
```

You can see more about the fetch process in "After git update remote the new upstream branches are visible but not origin".

edited May 23 '17 at 10:29

Community

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answered Oct 09 '14 at 15:14

VonC

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@SergiiBezgin What error message do you see? And what version of Git are you using? – VonC Oct 09 '14 at 15:24
Error is: fatal: Cannot setup tracking information; starting point 'origin/master' is not a branch. – Sergii Bezgin Oct 09 '14 at 15:26

score 4 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 10 '19 at 03:46

Usually after doing a git init and then also creating a repository in Github, the next thing I want to do is set my remote origin and tie my remote branch to my local master branch.

git init
git remote add origin <repository_url>
git fetch

Now, when I enter

 git branch --set-upstream-to=origin/master master

I get the error: fatal: branch 'master' does not exist

So, I did a

git branch -a

and found only

remotes/origin/master

Since I was in a newly created git repository, I did a simple

git checkout master

After this, git branch -a showed me the local master branch along with the remote,

master

remotes/origin/master

After this

git branch --set-upstream-to=origin/master master

gave no error and my local master branch was set to track the remote master branch.

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Feb 17 '17 at 19:08

I found this question while searching for

"fatal: branch 'integration/release/February' does not exist"

but the reason for the error in my case was different.

I "set upstream" enough that I'd made a bash alias for it, but when I tried to use the alias I introduced a space that meant the command I was sending was

git branch --set-upstream-to= integration/release/February

whereas what I needed, obviously, was

git branch --set-upstream-to=integration/release/February

Run command git branch --set-upstream-to produce error

3 Answers3