Git pulling depends on the current dir

Question

I am trying to git pull some repository via root user from any directory.

For example, executing git pull from /root/:

#> cd ~
#> sudo -u dmalikov git --git-dir=/home/dmalikov/path/to/repo/.git pull 
/usr/libexec/git-core/git-sh-setup: line 142: cd: /root/.: Permission denied
Cannot chdir to /root/., the toplevel of the working tree

And executing git pull from /:

#> cd /
#> sudo -u dmalikov git --git-dir=/home/dmalikov/path/to/repo/.git pull 
Already up-to-date.

Why did current directory affects git pulling command?

How can that redundant cd be avoided?

Solution 1

In your first example, the git command runs as user dmalikov with the current directory /root. Since the git pull command is equivalent to a git fetch followed by a git merge, and since git merge operates on the working tree, git tries to hunt for the working tree. As this user does not have permission to cd /root, the git command fails.

Even your second example doesn't work as you would expect. If there are actual changes to be pulled (instead of "Already up-to-date"), then the git pull will fail because it can't find the working tree.

You have a few simple options:

1) You can just do the git fetch portion of the operation by doing:

sudo -u dmalikov git --git-dir=/home/dmalikov/path/to/repo/.git fetch

which doesn't give any error for me.

2) You can add a cd to the working tree:

(cd /home/dmalikov/path/to/repo; sudo -u dmalikov git pull)

Solution 2

To answer my own comment, the /root was an interesting error

To have it work with --git-dir you also need to specify a work-tree directory

sudo -u dmalikov git --git-dir=/home/dmalikov/path/to/repo/.git --work-tree=/home/dmalikov/path/to/repo/.git pull

Comments

[bluesman]

Where is /root is it a folder inside your repo? If it is you shouldn't have permission issues. If /root is outside of your git structure, the question that begs to be asked is why is it accessing that folder in the first place?

[Ethan]

Why are you trying to work as root?

[ДМИТРИЙ МАЛИКОВ]

I am trying to work with root because it is a content of eix-sync.conf.

[ДМИТРИЙ МАЛИКОВ]

fatal: Could not change back to '/root': Permission denied

[ralphtheninja]

Changed my answer. It has to do with permissions and not --work-tree as I thought initially.

[ДМИТРИЙ МАЛИКОВ]

fatal: Could not change back to '/root': Permission denied

[bluesman]

What machine are you on? It will use your system (windows or linux) specific paths. The following works on my local machine (git bash on windows) $ git --git-dir=/c/workspace/changes/.git --work-tree=/c/workspace/changes/ pull Already up-to-date.

[ДМИТРИЙ МАЛИКОВ]

Try to execute your command from dir, where you cannot cd via non-root user.

[glerYbo]

Related: git --git-dir not working as expected: stackoverflow.com/questions/1386291/…