git · Git
The message
fatal: not a git repository (or any of the parent directories): .git
What it means
There is no .git in this directory or in any directory above it, so git could not find a repository. It happens when you are standing one level above or below the repository, when a clone landed in a different folder, or when you never ran git init. Check where you are with pwd first, and use git init only if you truly mean to start a repository here. Running git init inside a subfolder of an existing repository creates a second, nested repository that quietly shadows the outer one, and from then on the files in that folder never enter the outer commits.
The fix
git init- Printed by
- git
- Git
- 29
Almost every git error is a refusal that means "doing that from this state would lose something"; fatal: means git stopped without changing anything, and the hint: lines under the first line usually carry the actual remedy.
Reading an error message
- Read from the first line down. The lower you go the more it is about the tool’s internals; the cause is usually at the top.
- If there is a file and a line number, start there — not the top stack frame, but the topmost line that names a file you wrote.
- Search the message verbatim, but strip your own paths and variable names first; those are what stop the search from matching.
- The same condition is worded differently across tool versions. If results look wrong, add the version number to the query.
- Before pasting a fix, check what it throws away. Some of these cannot be undone.
Common questions
Q. What does “fatal: not a git repository (or any of the parent directories): .git” mean?
There is no .git in this directory or in any directory above it, so git could not find a repository. It happens when you are standing one level above or below the repository, when a clone landed in a different folder, or when you never ran git init. Check where you are with pwd first, and use git init only if you truly mean to start a repository here. Running git init inside a subfolder of an existing repository creates a second, nested repository that quietly shadows the outer one, and from then on the files in that folder never enter the outer commits.
Q. How do I fix it?
git init — before running it, check the explanation above for what this command discards.
Q. Which tool prints this?
git. It sits under Git, and the message runs to 12 words.