Why is it not a commit and a branch cannot be created from it?

Question

I need to work with an intricate configuration of repositories. I have 5 of them:

A remote central repository on machine 1.
My local repository on my notebook (machine 2).
A bare repository on machine 3.
A repository on machine 3.
A repository on machine 4 where we do code review.

So, my understanding that it works this way:

On my laptop (machine 2) I clone / pull from the central repository located on machine 1.
I push the local repo to the machine 3 (using the bare repository as a "intermediate").

Now I did some changes on the machine 3 and I want to push these changes to machine 4. Here are the instructions that I need to follow:

On machine 3 do all work in your test-branch, commit.
Push to your bare repo on machine 3: git push origin test-branch
On your laptop: fetch new commits from the machine-3 repo: git fetch machine3
Check out your branch from machine 3: git checkout -b test-branch machine-3/test-branch
Fetch commits from machine-4: git fetch origin
git rebase origin/master
git push origin HEAD:refs/for/master

I have problems with step 4. I get the following error:

fatal: 'machine3/test-branch' is not a commit and a branch 'test-branch' cannot be created from it

ADDED

When I execute

git rev-parse machine3/test-branch

On my laptop (machine 2) I get:

machine3/test-branch

fatal: ambiguous argument 'machine3/test-branch': unknown revision or path not in the working tree.
Use '--' to separate paths from revisions, like this:
'git <command> [<revision>...] -- [<file>...]'

The repo of Machine 3 is bare, which means it does not have any working tree. `git checkout -b test-branch machine-3/test-branch` needs a working tree, so it fails. Besides, you need to check if `machine3/test-branch` exists. https://mijingo.com/blog/what-is-the-working-tree-in-git — ElpieKay, Mar 15 '18 at 10:56
On machine 3 I have 2 repos (one bare and another one is non-bare). I have the "test-branch" in the non-bare repo on machine 3. — Roman, Mar 15 '18 at 11:01
Sorry I missed it. What does `git rev-parse machine3/test-branch` echo? — ElpieKay, Mar 15 '18 at 11:07
Let us [continue this discussion in chat](https://chat.stackoverflow.com/rooms/166889/discussion-between-elpiekay-and-roman). — ElpieKay, Mar 15 '18 at 11:43
@CharlieParker I have addressed your comment in [my answer below](https://stackoverflow.com/a/65756155/6309) — VonC, Jan 03 '23 at 20:39

J.D. Mallen · Answer 1 · 2020-05-14T16:52:57.747

195

For those who found this searching for an answer to fatal: 'origin/remote-branch-name' is not a commit and a branch 'local-branch-name' cannot be created from it, you may also want to try this first:

git fetch --all

If you run git checkout -b local-branch-name origin/remote-branch-name without fetching first, you can run into that error.

The reason it says "is not a commit" rather than something clearer like "branch doesn't exist" is because git takes the argument where you specified origin/remote-branch-name and tries to resolve it to a commit hash. You can use tag names and commit hashes as an argument here, too. If they fail, it generates the same error. If git can't resolve the branch you provide to a specific commit, it's usually because it doesn't have the freshest list of remote branches. git fetch --all fixes that scenario.

The --all flag is included in case you have multiple remotes (e.g. origin, buildserver, joespc, etc.), because git fetch by itself defaults to your first remote-- usually origin. You can also run fetch against a specific remote; e.g., git fetch buildserver will only fetch all the branches from the buildserver remote.

To list all your remotes, run the command git remote -v. You can omit the --all flag from git fetch if you only see one remote name (e.g. origin) in the results.

edited May 14 '20 at 16:52

answered Mar 28 '19 at 20:24

J.D. Mallen

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for me `git fetch origin` `git fetch origin master` did not help, I had to `git fetch origin refs/heads/master:refs/remotes/origin/master` – Silly Freak Sep 27 '19 at 09:16
3

@SillyFreak that's the only thing that worked for me. – Kristy Welsh Oct 23 '19 at 19:08
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@SillyFreak - I was failing to create an tracking branch for an upstream but it started working after : git fetch upstream refs/heads/master:refs/remotes/upstream/My-Remote-Branch-Name – SystemsInCode Oct 27 '20 at 14:35
what about git pull? – Charlie Parker Jan 03 '23 at 20:19
@CharlieParker `git pull` is just a shortcut command for `git fetch && git merge origin/master` or whatever your current remote name / remote branch is. So, yes, it would work, too. – J.D. Mallen Jan 16 '23 at 02:33

score 58 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 08 '21 at 12:29

58

We had this error:

fatal: 'origin/newbranch' is not a commit and a branch 'newbranch' cannot be created from it

because we did a minimalistic clone using:

git  clone  --depth 1  --branch 'oldbranch'  --single-branch  'git@github.com:user/repo.git'

For us the minimalistic fix was:

git  remote  set-branches  --add  'origin'  'newbranch'
git  fetch  'origin'
git  checkout  --track  'origin/newbranch'

Assuming the remote is called 'origin' and the remote branch is called 'newbranch'.

answered Jun 08 '21 at 12:29

Jeroen Vermeulen - MageHost

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Thank you! Been running in circles for an hour till I found your answer :) – Husam Ibrahim Sep 21 '21 at 21:43
1

I cloned single branch and failed when tracking new branch, this help me so much. – carboncrystal Aug 31 '22 at 03:54
1

At least someone understands that git repo can be GINORMOUS and using 'git fetch --all' is not an option – Anton K Nov 15 '22 at 05:52
2

In my case, this solution only worked for me among answers of this question. – developer0hye Nov 16 '22 at 00:58
what about git pull? – Charlie Parker Jan 03 '23 at 20:19

Player1 · Answer 3 · 2020-11-10T14:21:23.517

16

I managed to fix this with this settings, just update the config with this command

git config -e --global

and add this config.

[remote "origin"]
    url = https://git.example.com/example.git (you can omit this URL)
    fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*

and then you can git fetch --all

edited Nov 10 '20 at 14:21

answered Oct 13 '20 at 16:11

Player1

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It worked for me too. I had remove my only remote to get rid of all tracking branches at once, and that line was gone. – François Beaune Mar 03 '21 at 17:13
thanks, it solves my issue for fetching remote branches. – Atul Arvind Apr 21 '22 at 11:16

score 4 · Answer 4 · answered Oct 26 '21 at 20:45

I found this question troubleshooting simpler problem: I recieved same error trying to create a lobal branch from remote. I resolved it by creating branch from commit hash:

git ls-remote origin remote-branch
returned
<hash>  refs/heads/remote-branch

git checkout -b local-branch <hash>

score 3 · Answer 5 · answered Dec 13 '19 at 20:49

3

If you're checking out a branch from a tag (like git checkout -b XXXX v0.1.1) , you can try git fetch --tags first.

answered Dec 13 '19 at 20:49

ttfreeman

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score 1 · Answer 6 · answered Oct 21 '21 at 17:04

We were having this exact error in a Windows machine running gitbash on a folder synced with google drive.

It was caused by having the feature "Enable experimental built-in file system monitor" enabled.

After uninstalling and reinstalling gitbash with this feature disabled it was fixed.

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 15 '18 at 13:46

0

The question is complex / convolute, the answer is simple. There was a mismatch between the alias and machine3. The alias for the remote that has been used, was not for machine3. The machine3 had another alias.

answered Mar 15 '18 at 13:46

Roman

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For me the same error occured when I made a spelling mistake in my remote branch name. – nantitv Nov 23 '21 at 10:29

score 0 · Answer 8 · answered Feb 01 '21 at 13:24

0

For this issue:

fatal: 'machine3/test-branch' is not a commit and a branch 'test-branch' cannot be created from it

For me, I should have checked out to test-branch first, then it worked fine and created a new branch from test-branch.

answered Feb 01 '21 at 13:24

Vahid Najafi

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score 0 · Answer 9 · answered Jul 19 '22 at 08:22

0

I had the problem where I git checkout name-branch and it was created but when i check the branch with git branch nothing happens after hours of trying to figure out I tried to run the command git push GitHub-URL name-branch and it pushes the commit directly to the branch hope this helps

answered Jul 19 '22 at 08:22

life_of_webdeveloper

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Your answer could be improved with additional supporting information. Please [edit] to add further details, such as citations or documentation, so that others can confirm that your answer is correct. You can find more information on how to write good answers [in the help center](/help/how-to-answer). – Community Jul 20 '22 at 14:04

score 0 · Answer 10 · answered Jul 19 '22 at 15:45

0

My issues was I had a space in my new branch name

Issue:

git checkout -b my-new-branch name

instead of

git checkout -b my-new-branch-name

answered Jul 19 '22 at 15:45

SeanMC

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score 0 · Answer 11 · answered Aug 24 '22 at 19:54

0

The branch does not exist on the remote origin specified. Double check: You might be trying to pull oranges from a grapes tree.

answered Aug 24 '22 at 19:54

Matteus Barbosa

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score 0 · Answer 12 · answered Oct 13 '22 at 03:29

Check your git config in .git folder, and validate this content

[core]
    repositoryformatversion = 0
    fileMode = false
    bare = false
    logallrefupdates = true
    ignorecase = true
    precomposeunicode = true
[remote "origin"]
    url = https://github.com/ABC/project0001.git
    fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
[branch "main"]
    remote = origin
    merge = refs/heads/main
[pull]
    ff = no
[branch "develop"]
    remote = origin
    merge = refs/heads/develop

[remote "origin"] <-- this section

score 0 · Answer 13 · answered Nov 17 '22 at 13:44

For those who found this searching for an answer to fatal: 'origin/remote-branch-name' is not a commit and a branch 'local-branch-name' cannot be created from it, another possibility we just found is the remote branch has been merged already :embarrassed:

score 0 · Answer 14 · answered Dec 22 '22 at 18:27

I just encountered this when I used the "copy" tool on GitHub next to the branch name of a coworker's PR. His branch was named like coworker/ticket-number and git checkout --track coworker/ticket-number was what came out of the paste.

When I went back to my usual workflow, using git branch -r | grep ticket-number I found that the actual branch name I needed to use was origin/coworker/ticket-number.

VonC · Answer 15 · 2023-01-03T20:39:01.820

The solution from J.D. Mallen involves git fetch --all

Starting with VSCode 1.53 (Jan. 2021), you will have (issue 110811 and PR 111090):

Changing autofetch to a string config which has "current", "all" and "off".

This allows users to fetch from all remotes instead of just their origin.
For developers working on a Fork, this should make extensions work more intuitively.

So if you set the VSCode setting git.autofetch to "all", you won't even have to type git fetch --all.

Charlie Parker adds in the comments:

What about git pull?

That supposes you are on a current branch with a remote tracking branch already set up.

The original question does not have such a branch in place, which means git pull would not know what to merge from fetched branches.

score -2 · Answer 16 · answered Dec 13 '20 at 13:23

-2

I used git workflow in visual studio code as shown in the below diagram to solve mine:

answered Dec 13 '20 at 13:23

Okpo

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why is the answer voted down pls? I'd like to know, afterall I only mentioned the way I solve a similar problem. – Okpo Jan 01 '22 at 13:54

Why is it not a commit and a branch cannot be created from it?

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