Please describe the problem.

original question raised by John which lead me to the goose chase.

Following reproducer

#!/bin/bash

cd "$(mktemp -d ${TMPDIR:-/tmp}/dl-XXXXXXX)"
set -eux

git init --bare remote
( cd remote; git annex init; cat config )
rpath=$PWD/remote

git init repo
cd repo
git annex init
echo 'This is test text.' > file.txt
git add file.txt
git commit -m Init file.txt

git remote add --fetch remote-git $rpath

# without this -- there is no annex-uuid for  remote -- git-annex branch is not getting merged
git annex info

cat .git/config

# but this still fails
git annex initremote testremote type=git location=$rpath autoenable=true

ends with

[remote "remote-git"]
    url = /home/yoh/.tmp/dl-VjO0aSF/remote
    fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/remote-git/*
    annex-uuid = afdc6d54-cd6d-4a20-b639-a639f9c7ef09
+ git annex initremote testremote type=git location=/home/yoh/.tmp/dl-VjO0aSF/remote autoenable=true
initremote testremote 
git-annex: could not find existing git remote with specified location
failed
initremote: 1 failed

so

• error "could not find existing git remote with specified location" seems not descriptive of the underlying problem since location matches the url. Underlying issue is still not clear why we can't initremote
• as you could see in the script - need annex info to have annex-uuid populated and looking at code comment -- it requires UUID to be known. If not known -- ideally should be a dedicated error message ("remote blah found but lacks uuid, check if remote is annex")
• IMHO should not need manual annex info to merge git-annex branch

What steps will reproduce the problem?

above

What version of git-annex are you using? On what operating system?

10.20220504

fixed --Joey