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Trying to clone a remote git repository (bare), I get several errors like the following, after which git stops.

error: unable to create file frozen/email/lamson/mymailserver/run/queue/mark.name/cur/1361115664.1929_1.vps-pool-55:2,S (Invalid argument) 

It's okay if I have to remove these files, but I can't find a way to do that if I can't clone.

Any idea what I can do?

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3 Answers 3

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I guess you're probably trying to do the clone on a Windows machine. Windows doesn't allow filenames to use the : character.

From the Microsoft documentation:

Use any character in the current code page for a name, including Unicode characters and characters in the extended character set (128–255), except for the following:

  • The following reserved characters:
    • < (less than)
    • > (greater than)
    • : (colon)
    • " (double quote)
    • / (forward slash)
    • \ (backslash)
    • | (vertical bar or pipe)
    • ? (question mark)
    • * (asterisk)
  • Integer value zero, sometimes referred to as the ASCII NUL character.
  • Characters whose integer representations are in the range from 1 through 31, except for alternate data streams where these characters are allowed. For more information about file streams, see File Streams.
  • Any other character that the target file system does not allow.

To work around this problem, you will probably need to clone on a non-windows system and correct the offending filenames. Maybe some of the windows experts out there will have a better solution.

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5 Comments

I am on Ubuntu 12 (and the file was created on another Ubuntu)
Hmm - that's a bit strange, then. Can you show some more context from the error log?
This (for several files) is all the console shows. However, your solution (cloning to a non-bare repository on another machine and resolving the problem there) worked!
Were you using a filesystem that can't handle one of those characters?
I can't find a list, but I think that's it!
3

I'm cross-referencing my answer, as it also applies here: https://stackoverflow.com/a/34515900/1012586

Yet instead of

* !kickstarter/parsers/data/kickstarter/campaigndetails/* 

you'd need something like

* !frozen/email/lamson/mymailserver/run/queue/mark.name/cur/* 

in your .git/info/sparse-checkout

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0

git will refuse to overwrite existing files. Try again, cloning into an empty directory.

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