Git remote disappearance and inconsistency

Question

• I copied a file to local .git/config, to update my local user config for a project.
• Afterwards, all remotes "disappeared" (kind of)
• git remote is empty, as is any remote-tracking information.
• Local .git/refs/remotes shows the old remotes, as does git branch --remote

How to recover the state of the repo?

Answer 1

The .git/config file is local only, not tracked by Git.

If you remember the URL for those remotes, you would need to add them back manually:

git remote add origin /url/remote/repo
git remote add upstream(or any other remote name) /url/upstream/repo
...