Git Stash Failed

Question

I am using SmartGit in Windows. Today I needed to do a hard reset back a couple commits. SmartGit automatically made a stash for me of my modified files.

After the reset, it tried to apply the stash:

$ git.exe stash apply --index stash@{0}

But it gave me:

Apply Stash: stash failed (return code 1)

I can view the stash contents and see all my code, but I can't apply the stash. How do I fix this?

score 6 · Accepted Answer · edited Feb 21 '23 at 06:18

6

Just do git stash pop. It will get you your stashed changes in the working tree. (pop considering you want stash@{0}.

edited Feb 21 '23 at 06:18

Zoe

27,060
21
118
148

answered Feb 17 '15 at 06:27

Mudassir Razvi

1,783
12
33

score 4 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 17 '15 at 04:01

4

Can you export it to a patch, and then try to apply manually?

git stash show -p > my_stash.patch

answered Feb 17 '15 at 04:01

acanby

2,936
24
26

I will try that. Is a stash the same format as a patch? – Jake Wilson Feb 17 '15 at 04:15
No, but the -p will output a patch like format. Note that this patch will not include changes you already have in your working directory. – acanby Feb 18 '15 at 00:50

score 4 · Answer 3 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:23

There are several things you can do:

git apply --index tries to preserve the staged vs unstaged setup of the stash you're applying. Often this is "too hard" but applying without --index, allowing all the changes to become unstaged, is possible. If you don't need to maintain the separation, that may "just work".
As acanby suggested, you can turn the stash into a patch. Note that git stash show shows only the unstaged part of the stash, so this is somewhat like not using --index as well.
If all else fails, you can turn your saved stash into its own (new) branch. This will resurrect all the commits you reset-away, but only on that new branch. In essence,¹ what git stash branch newbranch does is:
- turn the saved index in the stash into an ordinary commit
- whose parent is the commit that was active (was the HEAD commit) when you did the git stash save step (and its parent is its same old parent, etc);
- make the index-commit tip of the branch newbranch, which is a newly created branch; and
- leave the work-tree and (if saved as part of the stash) untracked/all files ready for you to commit on the new branch you're now on.

¹It's really "fact" more than "essence": this is how git stash branch works simply because it leaves the i commit of the stash-bag in place and makes a new branch-name pointing to it.

Git Stash Failed

3 Answers3