CODEWITHSUNDEEP
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Natasha
Natasha

Reputation: 1521

Removing large files from git

This is a follow up to my previous post here. I'm trying to remove a large file that I committed to git. Based on the suggestion given in my previous post, I tried

git filter-branch --force --index-filter "git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch folder/Unconfirmed 866711.crdownload" --prune-empty --tag-name-filter cat -- --all

Following the above command, I tried to push all the changes

git push origin --force --all

However, I got the same error that was displayed before using filter-branch

remote: error: File folder/Unconfirmed 866711.crdownload is 486.30 MB; this exceeds GitHub's file size limit of 100.00 MB

Alternatively, I also tried

git add --all

git filter-branch -f --index-filter "git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch folder/Unconfirmed 866711.crdownload" HEAD

But, I get the following

Cannot rewrite branches: Your index contains uncommitted changes.

I'm not sure if I have missed any command or flags. Any suggestions?

Upvotes: 0

Views: 562

Answers (1)

Saurabh P Bhandari
Saurabh P Bhandari

Reputation: 6742

Cannot rewrite branches: Your index contains uncommitted changes.

You have uncommitted changes in your working directory i.e changes staged for a commit (check git status output) . Either commit those changes if you wish to or preserve those uncommitted changes by using stash and apply them once you have executed the filter-branch command.

If you don't want the uncommitted changes, then you can perform a hard reset.

git reset --hard HEAD

As @torek mentioned in the comment below and as per GitHub help page, it is not recommended to use stash before filter-branch

Warning: If you run git filter-branch after stashing changes, you won't be able to retrieve your changes with other stash commands. Before running git filter-branch, we recommend unstashing any changes you've made.

So instead commit the changes if you want to preserve the uncommitted changes. Then proceed with the filter-branch command.

Your filter-branch command, is missing single quotes (to account for the space in the name of the file to be deleted)

git filter-branch -f --index-filter "git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch 'folder/Unconfirmed 866711.crdownload'" HEAD

Upvotes: 3

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