Re: end-of-line diff checkout direction dependence problem

Answers and new response below.

Thomas Vieten wrote:

On 2015-06-30 16.12, Thomas Vieten wrote:

quoted

We face a very inconvenient problem with end-of-line diffs which are 
not "real".
We know the end-of-line problem very well as we thought.
But now we found a new phenomenon and nobody mentioning it.

Consider the following repository structure:

          -----------|----|------------->branch1
        /
master
        \
----------|-------|---------|--------------->branch2

The branches are based on master/head.
We just consider one branch here, e.g. branch1 .

Working with the head of branch1 gives no problems. No end-of-line 
diffs.
Also going back in the direction of master - no problems.
Only in the case if we do a checkout from branch1 to master, then
all of a sudden end-of-line diffs appear.
The files might be changed, but the end-of-line attributes in 
gitattributes are
not changed in the branch.

It seems to be the case that since the last change to the files which 
pop up
with eol differences, gittattributes where changed and touch their 
extensions.

With the operation

git ls-files -z | xargs -0 rm -f  # delete all the files of this 
version - here
master/head
git reset --hard                  # force checkout of master/head and 
reset index

The problem disappears! No eol problems anymore. Something like a 
brute force
checkout.

Also checking out versions in the direction of branch1 give never 
end-of-line
diffs.

What has changed somewhen are the gitattributes.

We estimate that this becomes a problem when applying the diffs from 
branch1 in
the direction of
the master. Finally then the diffs result in a different state from 
the master.

But when the master is checked out freshly, this difference does not 
appear.

Very, very annoying.

We check now every time when these end-of-line diffs appear, if they 
are really
end of line diffs

git diff --ignore-space-at-eol

and then try the procedure above.

But to have a dependence from the direction of the checkout is 
somewhat irritating.

If this is not a bug - then how to avoid it ?

bye for now

Thomas

The things which are described don't sound unfamilar.
First some questions:
Which Git/OS are you running on ?

CYGWIN ?
Git-for-Windows ?

git version 1.9.2.msysgit.0
+tortoisegit, for viewing and conflicts

Linux ?
Other ?

Windows 7 Pro

Which versions ?
How does your .gitattribute file look like ?

see the file attachend to the end of this message

It may be, that you need to "nornalize" your repo:

https://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/gitattributes.html
The search for this text
"When text=auto normalization"
and follow the instructions:

in principle we know all this.
What is remarkable that we are able to checkout a version of master 
which is not consistent with the repo, and more, dependent from the 
checkout direction (if the direction is the positive or negative history 
in time). And on the other hand we can checkout a version of master 
which is in sync with the master.

Normally such conflicts with not normalised repos appear immediately 
also in positive history direction. And then it is possible to detect them.
The other way around - negative history and diffs - it causes a big 
questionmark.

On the other hand this would lead to the mandatory work flow advice: 
"Always normalize the repository after changes within the gitattributes 
file"
And then: Should this then not be automatically be done somehow in the 
background by git ?
Reasoning: if the "git machine" is causing this behaviour 
systematically, shouldn't the machine itself have compensation, correction?

Depending on your point of view this could be seen as a bug.

There is also a big question open: will normalisation really help ? 
Because there must be one commit with the new gitattributes and then you 
normalize.
But the "wrong diff" is in the repo and will cause the problem when 
going back to master in the negative direction.
This is how understand it up to now.

But at this point git is complex and we are not really the experts.

best regards

Thomas V.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
.gitattributes
#Set default behaviour, in case users don't have core.autocrlf set.
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