Please describe the problem.
I have used assistant on that box but forgot how I start it etc... so finally came up with a systemd recipe which seems to start it
reprostim@reproiner:/data/reprostim$ cat ~/.config/systemd/user/git-annex-assistant.service
[Unit]
Description=Git Annex Assistant Service
After=network.target
[Service]
WorkingDirectory=/data/reprostim
ExecStart=/usr/bin/git annex assistant --foreground
Restart=on-failure
RestartSec=10
[Install]
WantedBy=default.target
which seemed to start it nicely on booth, but I did not see anything committed/transferred. Even if I stop the systemd service, and start from terminal (remote via ssh), we see
reprostim@reproiner:/data/reprostim$ git annex --debug assistant --foreground
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.609958543] (Utility.Process) process [5887] read: uname ["-o"]
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.611617504] (Utility.Process) process [5887] done ExitSuccess
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.614088771] (Utility.Process) process [5888] read: uname ["-o"]
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.615900478] (Utility.Process) process [5888] done ExitSuccess
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.617482785] (Assistant) logging to .git/annex/daemon.log
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.618258041] (Annex.Branch) read remote.log
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.632058148] (Utility.Process) process [5889] chat: git ["--git-dir=.git","--work-tree=.","--literal-pathspecs","-c","annex.debug=true","cat-file","--batch"]
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.635478016] (Annex.Branch) read proxy.log
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.636566897] (Annex.Branch) read trust.log
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.63751056] (Assistant) logging to .git/annex/daemon.log
and in that daemon.log:
reprostim@reproiner:/data/reprostim$ cat .git/annex/daemon.log
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.640121818] (Annex.Branch) read schedule.log
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.64120032] (Utility.Process) process [5892] chat: git ["--git-dir=.git","--work-tree=.","--literal-pathspecs","-c","annex.debug=true","cat-file","--batch"]
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.655526372] (Annex.Branch) read schedule.log
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.662389467] (Utility.Process) process [5895] read: lsof ["-F0can","--",".git/reprostim-videocapture.lock"]
lsof: WARNING: can't stat() fuse.gvfsd-fuse file system /run/user/113/gvfs
Output information may be incomplete.
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.707976737] (Utility.Process) process [5895] done ExitSuccess
[2025-05-08 14:08:32.708169976] (SanityCheckerStartup) Waiting for 60 seconds for git lock file writer
[2025-05-08 14:09:32.769444892] (Utility.Process) process [6090] read: lsof ["-F0can","--",".git/reprostim-videocapture.lock"]
lsof: WARNING: can't stat() fuse.gvfsd-fuse file system /run/user/113/gvfs
Output information may be incomplete.
[2025-05-08 14:09:32.824400459] (Utility.Process) process [6090] done ExitSuccess
[2025-05-08 14:09:32.82450385] (SanityCheckerStartup) Waiting for 60 seconds for git lock file writer
[2025-05-08 14:10:32.873375671] (Utility.Process) process [6281] read: lsof ["-F0can","--",".git/reprostim-videocapture.lock"]
lsof: WARNING: can't stat() fuse.gvfsd-fuse file system /run/user/113/gvfs
Output information may be incomplete.
[2025-05-08 14:10:32.930940073] (Utility.Process) process [6281] done ExitSuccess
[2025-05-08 14:10:32.931056974] (SanityCheckerStartup) Waiting for 60 seconds for git lock file writer
[2025-05-08 14:11:32.992138737] (Utility.Process) process [6464] read: lsof ["-F0can","--",".git/reprostim-videocapture.lock"]
lsof: WARNING: can't stat() fuse.gvfsd-fuse file system /run/user/113/gvfs
Output information may be incomplete.
[2025-05-08 14:11:33.063544538] (Utility.Process) process [6464] done ExitSuccess
[2025-05-08 14:11:33.063652636] (SanityCheckerStartup) Waiting for 60 seconds for git lock file writer
and no new files are added/committed etc.
May be I am invoking assistant incorrectly? (FWIW when I echoed that path into /home/reprostim/.config/git-annex/autostart, and start with --autostart option, then it seems to start two of the processes and still to not commit anything)
What version of git-annex are you using? On what operating system?
reprostim@reproiner:/data/reprostim$ git annex version
git-annex version: 10.20250115-1~ndall+1
build flags: Assistant Webapp Pairing Inotify DBus DesktopNotify TorrentParser MagicMime Servant Benchmark Feeds Testsuite S3 WebDAV
dependency versions: aws-0.22.1 bloomfilter-2.0.1.0 cryptonite-0.29 DAV-1.3.4 feed-1.3.2.1 ghc-9.0.2 http-client-0.7.13.1 persistent-sqlite-2.13.1.0 torrent-10000.1.1 uuid-1.3.15 yesod-1.6.2.1
key/value backends: SHA256E SHA256 SHA512E SHA512 SHA224E SHA224 SHA384E SHA384 SHA3_256E SHA3_256 SHA3_512E SHA3_512 SHA3_224E SHA3_224 SHA3_384E SHA3_384 SKEIN256E SKEIN256 SKEIN512E SKEIN512 BLAKE2B256E BLAKE2B256 BLAKE2B512E BLAKE2B512 BLAKE2B160E BLAKE2B160 BLAKE2B224E BLAKE2B224 BLAKE2B384E BLAKE2B384 BLAKE2BP512E BLAKE2BP512 BLAKE2S256E BLAKE2S256 BLAKE2S160E BLAKE2S160 BLAKE2S224E BLAKE2S224 BLAKE2SP256E BLAKE2SP256 BLAKE2SP224E BLAKE2SP224 SHA1E SHA1 MD5E MD5 WORM URL GITBUNDLE GITMANIFEST VURL X*
remote types: git gcrypt p2p S3 bup directory rsync web bittorrent webdav adb tahoe glacier ddar git-lfs httpalso borg rclone hook external
operating system: linux x86_64
supported repository versions: 8 9 10
upgrade supported from repository versions: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
local repository version: 10
Please advise
git annex assistwouldn't do those things. It was erratic and a re-clone appeared to fix it. It feels like a repo-size thing - the problematic one is a big repo with a lot of unlocked files and I feel like those are troublemakers, often needlessly appearing as changed ingit diff. Smaller repos no problemo. Just my doubtly helpful anecdotal evidence.It's pretty easy to replicate this behavior:
And while that process is still running, start the assistant.
It might be some other ".lock" file or perhaps
.git/gc.pidthat a process has open for write. The assistant does not want to start running with a stale git lock file, which is a pretty common problem given the way that git lock files work. So when the lock file exists, it waits for it to have no writers, before removing it.I see, in my case I have no git lock files but rather a lock file for our process:
which I guess
git-annextreats as a git lock file. Is there a way to make them two play nicely without me coming up with some alternative location which is to be ignored by git but local to this repository? May be only known to belong togitlock files should be considered? Or may be me placing it under.git/reprostim-videocapture/lockwould be satisfactory? (do not want to interrupt ATM - doing useful stuff)After all both of them "are not git" (in that they both also use
.git/space for their own needs)It's treating
*.lockas git lock files. Any other filename won't have the problem.635c9a1549f28992b6ae370f6e8687170c971525 has a rationalle for that, that git has other lock files than index.lock. It does seem to me to be doubtful that any other stale git lock than index.lock would cause significant trouble to the assistant.
But this code is supposed to deal with stale locks. This lock is not stale; it has a process holding it open. So the assistant has no reason to wait on it. I've removed the wait loop.