Git checkout: updating paths is incompatible with switching branches

Question

My problem is related to Fatal Git error when switching branch.

I try to fetch a remote branch with the command

git checkout -b local-name origin/remote-name

but I get this error message:

fatal: git checkout: updating paths is incompatible with switching branches.
Did you intend to checkout 'origin/remote-name' which can not be resolved as commit?

If I manually create a branch and then pull the remote branch, it works, just as making a new clone and checking the branch out.

Why does it not work on the repository I work with?

what has changed since the first instance of that command (triggering the error message) ? — VonC
– VonC, Commented Jun 3, 2009 at 19:43
git init git fetch git fetch git://blabla.com/dir1/Project.git — user1867173
– user1867173, Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 18:20

Bruno Bronosky · Accepted Answer · 2013-02-14 21:02:52Z

746

I believe this occurs when you are trying to checkout a remote branch that your local git repo is not aware of yet. Try:

git remote show origin

If the remote branch you want to checkout is under "New remote branches" and not "Tracked remote branches" then you need to fetch them first:

git remote update git fetch

Now it should work:

git checkout -b local-name origin/remote-name

edited Feb 14, 2013 at 21:02

Bruno Bronosky

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answered Sep 3, 2009 at 2:52

user167628

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14 Comments

Jessedc Over a year ago

This solved the problem for me, not the above arbitrary answer.

Mike Thomsen Over a year ago

That should be "git fetch REPOSITORY_NAME" to get all of the branches on that repository.

Michael Grinich Over a year ago

not necessarily. git fetch will get all of the branches from all remote repos.

Alexander Kellett Over a year ago

In case anyone else struggles with the utter craziness of all this: git fetch origin/branchname Is not the same as git fetch. The former simply results in "new (next fetch will store in remotes/origin)" displaying in a column visible via git remote show origin.

Bruno Bronosky Over a year ago

If you are trying to do this for a remote that you explicitly added (so anything other than origin) you will need to do git remote update before your fetch will fetch that remote. Otherwise you get messages like Did you intend to checkout 'upstream-repo/master' which can not be resolved as commit? Please add this to the answer and save people hours worth of reading the same answers that only work for origin.

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Peter Mortensen · Accepted Answer · 2011-01-29 09:26:56Z

151

Alternate syntax,

git fetch origin remote_branch_name:local_branch_name

edited Jan 29, 2011 at 9:26

Peter Mortensen

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answered Oct 23, 2009 at 17:52

Rare Pleasures

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8 Comments

Rimian Over a year ago

This worked for me. My remote branch name isn't origin. I don't know if that makes a difference as I have been drinking vodka.

codercake Over a year ago

This is not just an alternate syntax, but can work when git checkout -b branch_name origin/branch_name does not work

kakyo Over a year ago

This also fixed my problem when running "git checkout --track origin/remote-branch", which originally gave the same error as OP's before the fix. Thanks!

AsTeR Over a year ago

Worked for me after running also the validated answer.

John Kelleher Over a year ago

Yes, I suspect the --depth qualifier for the original clone may be at fault here. I had success with git fetch remote_branch_name:local_branch_name but all other advice failed.

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Community · Accepted Answer · 2017-05-23 12:10:43Z

After having tried most of what I could read in this thread without success, I stumbled across this one: Remote branch not showing up in "git branch -r"

It turned out that my .git/config file was incorrect. After doing a simple fix all branches showed up.

Going from

[remote "origin"] url = http://stash.server.com/scm/EX/project.git fetch = +refs/heads/master:refs/remotes/origin/master

to

[remote "origin"] url = http://stash.server.com/scm/EX/project.git fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*

Did the trick

That's indeed an odd configuration. It tells git to only fetch the master branch from the remote.
I would vote it up 10 times if I could! - this seems to be some thing that new git does when cloning
I had the same problem, it was driving me crazy. Anyone not seeing remote branches, please check this!!

VirtualStaticVoid · Accepted Answer · 2011-02-23 20:42:26Z

Not sure if this is helpful or exactly relevant to your question, but if you are trying to fetch and checkout only a single branch from the remote repository, then the following git commands will do the trick:

url= << URL TO REPOSITORY >> branch= << BRANCH NAME >> git init git remote add origin $url git fetch origin $branch:origin/$branch git checkout -b $branch --track origin/$branch

Olivier Refalo · Accepted Answer · 2011-07-11 20:33:32Z

none of the above worked for me. My situation is slightly different, my remote branch is not at origin. but in a different repository.

git remote add remoterepo GIT_URL.git git fetch remoterepo git checkout -b branchname remoterepo/branchname

tip: if you don't see the remote branch in the following output git branch -v -a there is no way to check it out.

Confirmed working on 1.7.5.4

+1 for git branch -v -a: I had an incorrectly configured remote that said fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/master/* even though the remote was called upstream.

Matt · Accepted Answer · 2012-04-26 20:38:28Z

For me what worked was:

git fetch

Which pulls all the refs down to your machine for all the branches on remote. Then I could do

git checkout <branchname>

and that worked perfectly. Similar to the top voted answer, but a little more simple.

Peter Mortensen · Accepted Answer · 2011-01-22 14:43:47Z

I suspect there is no remote branch named remote-name, but that you've inadvertently created a local branch named origin/remote-name.

Is it possible you at some point typed:

 git branch origin/remote-name

Thus creating a local branch named origin/remote-name? Type this command:

 git checkout origin/remote-name

You'll either see:

 Switched to branch "origin/remote-name"

which means it's really a mis-named local branch, or

 Note: moving to "origin/rework-isscoring" which isn't a local branch If you want to create a new branch from this checkout, you may do so (now or later) by using -b with the checkout command again. Example: git checkout -b

which means it really is a remote branch.

Edward J Beckett · Accepted Answer · 2011-09-19 00:34:59Z

It's not very intuitive but this works well for me ...

 mkdir remote.git & cd remote.git & git init git remote add origin $REPO git fetch origin $BRANCH:refs/remotes/origin/$BRANCH

THEN run the git branch --track command ...

 git branch --track $BRANCH origin/$BRANCH

Thomas · Accepted Answer · 2017-12-08 15:53:03Z

For me I had a typo and my remote branch didn't exist

Use git branch -a to list remote branches

Community · Accepted Answer · 2017-05-23 12:18:23Z

Could your issue be linked to this other SO question "checkout problem"?

i.e.: a problem related to:

an old version of Git
a curious checkout syntax, which should be: git checkout -b [<new_branch>] [<start_point>], with [<start_point>] referring to the name of a commit at which to start the new branch, and 'origin/remote-name' is not that.
(whereas git branch does support a start_point being the name of a remote branch)

Note: what the checkout.sh script says is:

 if test '' != "$newbranch$force$merge" then die "git checkout: updating paths is incompatible with switching branches/forcing$hint" fi

It is like the syntax git checkout -b [] [remote_branch_name] was both renaming the branch and resetting the new starting point of the new branch, which is deemed incompatible.

The problem is solved. git checkout -b local-name remote/remote-branch does actually work
Interesting, what has changed since the first instance of that command (triggering the error message) ?

eMPee584 · Accepted Answer · 2012-05-29 16:23:32Z

After fetching a zillion times still added remotes didn't show up, although the blobs were in the pool. Turns out the --tags option shouldn't be given to git remote add for whatever reason. You can manually remove it from the .git/config to make git fetch create the refs.

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