--git-dir and --work-tree separation issue

Please describe the problem.

When --git-dir and --work-tree deviate from standard, running commands like git annex list fails in untracked directories.

What steps will reproduce the problem?

see transcript below
separate --git-dir and --work-tree as commonly used to track one's dotfiles
run git annex list in an untracked directory
error is error: pathspec 'DIRECTORY' did not match any file(s) known to git

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

git-annex version: 10.20230627-g2469720e1

Please provide any additional information below.

# If you can, paste a complete transcript of the problem occurring here.
# If the problem is with the git-annex assistant, paste in .git/annex/daemon.log

+ set -x
+ chmod +w -R .dotfiles
+ rm -rf .dotfiles
+ git init --bare .dotfiles
Initialized empty Git repository in /home/yann2/.dotfiles/
+ alias 'dit=git --work-tree=$HOME --git-dir=$HOME/.dotfiles'
+ echo '*' > .gitignore
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles add -f .gitignore
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles commit -m 'add gitignore'
[main (root-commit) 65d21e1] add gitignore
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+)
 create mode 100644 .gitignore
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles annex init
init  ok
(recording state in git...)
+ mkdir dir1
+ cd dir1
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles annex list
here
|web
||bittorrent
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Did you forget to 'git add'?
list: 1 failed
+ touch myfile
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles annex add --no-check-gitignore myfile
add myfile 
ok
(recording state in git...)
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles annex sync -m 'add file in dir1'
git-annex sync will change default behavior to operate on --content in a future version of git-annex. Recommend you explicitly use --no-content (or -g) to prepare for that change. (Or you can configure annex.synccontent)
commit  
[main da84a6c] add file in dir1
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+)
 create mode 120000 dir1/myfile
ok
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles annex list
here
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X__ myfile
+ cd
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles annex list
here
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X__ dir1/myfile
+ mkdir dir2
+ cd dir2
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles annex list
here
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||bittorrent
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error: pathspec 'dir2/' did not match any file(s) known to git
Did you forget to 'git add'?
list: 1 failed
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles -C /home/yann2 annex list
here
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||bittorrent
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X__ dir1/myfile
+ git --work-tree=/home/yann2 --git-dir=/home/yann2/.dotfiles -C / annex list
here
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||bittorrent
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X__ dir1/myfile
# End of transcript or log.

Have you had any luck using git-annex before? (Sometimes we get tired of reading bug reports all day and a lil' positive end note does wonders)

Yep, git-annex is awesome! 🥳

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comment 1

I reproduced the behavior you showed.

But git behaves the same way in the same situation. Compare these two commands:

joey@darkstar:~/tmp/bench/dir2>git --work-tree=/home/joey/tmp/bench --git-dir=/home/joey/tmp/bench/.dotfiles annex list
here
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||bittorrent
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error: pathspec 'dir2/' did not match any file(s) known to git
Did you forget to 'git add'?
list: 1 failed

joey@darkstar:~/tmp/bench/dir2>git --git-dir=../.git --work-tree=.. ls-files --stage --error-unmatch --
error: pathspec 'dir2/' did not match any file(s) known to git
Did you forget to 'git add'?

The second command is actually what the first command runs internally.

Also, the behavior does not have anything to do with --git-dir and --work-tree:

joey@darkstar:~/tmp/bench>git init repo
Initialized empty Git repository in /home/joey/tmp/bench/repo/.git/
joey@darkstar:~/tmp/bench>cd repo
joey@darkstar:~/tmp/bench/repo>git-annex init
init  ok
m(recording state in git...)
joey@darkstar:~/tmp/bench/repo>mkdir dir2
joey@darkstar:~/tmp/bench/repo>cd dir2
joey@darkstar:~/tmp/bench/repo/dir2>git-annex list
here
|web
||bittorrent
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error: pathspec 'dir2/' did not match any file(s) known to git
Did you forget to 'git add'?
list: 1 failed

So if there's a bug here, it's that git-annex list displays an error message when run in a subdirectory that does not contain any files tracked by git.

Also, many other git-annex commands run git ls-files --error-unmatch and so behave the same when run in such a subdirectory. Including whereis, find, get, etc.

In fact, annex.skipunknown controls whether --error-unmatch is used. Setting it to true will avoid this behavior. But there were good reasons to change the annex.skipunknown default to false. And good reasons to use --error-unmatch to implement that.

Also, this behavior is somewhat documented, in the documentation of annex.skipunknown, it specifically talks about the case where no files in the current (or specified) directory are tracked by git.

So in my opinion, this does not seem like a bug.

Comment by joey — Wed Sep 13 16:46:35 2023

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