It's subtle but you have to use `--force` instead of `--force-with-lease --force-if-includes` after you make a modification to an existing stash. This means you must export AND push each time you make a change to the stash (i.e. pushing, popping).

So what I was trying to illustrate is that you must export and push each time. In order to do that -- and keep the remote up-to-date -- you have to use a force push. That's the only way I've found that I can ensure my remote stash stays in sync with my local stash. Otherwise, if I clear my local stash (to simulate losing it) then import the remote stash, I can ensure everything is restored with all changes restored.

I'm also using GitHub as my remote. Not sure if that matters, though.

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On Sep 19, 2025, at 8:04 AM, Phillip Wood [off-list ref] wrote:

Hi Brooke

On 11/09/2025 03:22, Brooke Kuhlmann wrote:

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I'm unable to reproduce this. In the script below the final push succeeds.

That's because you need to export every time before you push. Like this:
touch one.txt
git stash push --include-untracked --message "One"
git stash export --to-ref "refs/stashes/$USER"
git push --no-verify --force-with-lease --force-if-includes origin "refs/stashes/$USER"
git stash pop
git stash push --include-untracked --message "One II"
git stash export --to-ref "refs/stashes/$USER"
git push --no-verify --force-with-lease --force-if-includes origin "refs/stashes/$USER"
The above will yield the following error:
 ! [rejected]                  refs/stashes/bkuhlmann -> refs/stashes/bkuhlmann (remote ref updated since checkout)
error: failed to push some refs to 'https://github.com/bkuhlmann/test'
hint: Updates were rejected because the tip of the remote-tracking branch has
hint: been updated since the last checkout. If you want to integrate the
hint: remote changes, use 'git pull' before pushing again.
hint: See the 'Note about fast-forwards' in 'git push --help' for details.
However, if you perform the above with only the single "git stash export" then you won't get the error as you discovered in your workflow.

I'm confused by this, here is the relevant part of my script again

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    git stash push
    git stash export --to-ref refs/stashes/test

This is the first export before pushing

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    git push origin refs/stashes/test
    git stash pop
    git stash push -m message
    git stash export --to-ref refs/stashes/test

This is the second export before pushing

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    git push --force-with-lease --force-if-includes  origin refs/stashes/test

I'm afraid I'm struggling to see what the difference is.

Thanks

Phillip

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The only way I've been able to make this work is to do this:
touch one.txt
git stash push --include-untracked --message "One"
git stash export --to-ref "refs/stashes/$USER"
git push --no-verify --force origin "refs/stashes/$USER"
git stash pop
git stash push --include-untracked --message "One II"
git stash export --to-ref "refs/stashes/$USER"
git push --no-verify --force origin "refs/stashes/$USER"
Notice that I always export before the push AND that I'm using `--force` each time. That's the only way to ensure your local stash is in sync with the remote stash.
You can always verify that the remote stash is being updated by always clearing your local stash and then immediately importing to check if your stash message was updated properly. Example:
git stash clear
git stash import "refs/stashes/$USER"
git stash list
Once you perform the import, and immediately list what's in your stash, you should see something similar to the following:
stash@{0} 6ba4eaea3751 On main: One II
When your remote stash isn't updated, you'll see this:
stash@{0} 6ba4eaea3751 On main: One
(Notice the difference between the message of "One" versus "One II")

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You can force the creation of a reflog

I tried that too which makes the error go away but doesn't update the remote stash at all. Example:
touch one.txt
git stash push --include-untracked --message "One"
git stash export --to-ref "refs/stashes/$USER"
git push --no-verify --force-with-lease --force-if-includes origin "refs/stashes/$USER"
git stash pop
git stash push --include-untracked --message "One II"
oid=$(git rev-parse --verify refs/stashes/$USER) &&
  git update-ref -d refs/stashes/$USER &&
  git update-ref --create-reflog -m 'export stashes' refs/stashes/$USER $oid
git push --no-verify --force-with-lease --force-if-includes origin "refs/stashes/$USER"
The above works but if I run `git stash clear && git stash import "refs/stashes/$USER"`, I find that my local stash doesn't have the message change (still using "One" instead of "One II" which means the remote stash never got updated).
Sadly, I can only seem to make this work when using a force push but would definitely be nice to not have to use a force push.

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   set -ex
   dir="$(mktemp -d)"
   cd "$dir"
   git init --bare origin
   git init repo
   cd repo
   git remote add origin "file://${PWD%/*}/origin"
   git config core.logAllRefUpdates always
   git config remote.origin.fetch refs/stashes/*:refs/remote/origin/stashes/*
   echo a >a
   git add a
   git commit -m a
   echo b >a
   git stash push
   echo c >a
   git stash push
   git stash export --to-ref refs/stashes/test
   git push origin refs/stashes/test
   git stash pop
   git stash push -m message
   git stash export --to-ref refs/stashes/test
   git push --force-with-lease --force-if-includes  origin refs/stashes/test

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You need to pass the name of the ref whose reflog you want to look at,
otherwise it defaults to showing the reflog for HEAD. You should be
able to see the reflog for you exported stashes.>

I gave this a try and every time I use `git reflog refs/stashes/$USER`,
I always get a blank response. No errors and no output.

Ah, I wonder if core.logAllRefUpdates only affects the creation of new
refs. You can force the creation of a reflog by running

oid=$(git rev-parse --verify refs/stashes/$USER) &&
git update-ref -d refs/stashes/$USER &&
git update-ref --create-reflog -m 'export stashes' refs/stashes/$USER $oid

the same applies to refs/remote/stashes/origin/$USER

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Let's try and find why the remote update say's it rejected when it isn't
and then we can think about the best way to document pushing and
pulling exported stashes.

I haven't thought much about the pulling side of this. "git stash import"
appends to the existing stashes so I'm not sure how we'd cope with forced
updates - have got got any experience of handling this from your
experiments?

Thanks

Phillip