Error cannot delete branch git

There can be a couple of scenarios wherein you would wish to delete branch. Following are some of the possible scenarios:

1. Delete git branch locally
2. Delete git branch remotely
3. Delete git branch both locally and globally
4. Perform git merge and Delete git branch

We will cover all these scenarios individually with the best recommendation to do this the right way.

Prepare Environment

I have setup my repository git_examples using GitLab.

Following is my git version:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git --version
git version 2.32.0

I will clone my repository from gitlab to my local workstation:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git clone git@gitlab.com:golinuxcloud/git_examples.git

Git delete branch locally

If your branch is only available on your local workstation repository then you must follow this section. Currently I have following branch in the local repository of my workstation:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch
  issue-5632
  issue-6291
  issue-9538
* main
  my-feature-branch

To check the list of remote branches (i.e. branch which are available on the remote gitlab server):

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --remotes
  origin/HEAD -> origin/main
  origin/main
  origin/my-feature-branch

So the following branch are only present on my local workstation only but not on the remote:

  issue-5632
  issue-6291
  issue-9538

Since these branches are not available on remote, so I just need to delete them locally.

ALSO READ: Git rebase explained in detail with examples

Scenario-1: Fix error: Cannot delete branch ‘XXX’ checked out at ‘YYY’

To delete a branch locally use the following command syntax:

git branch --delete|-d <local_branch_name>

First step, make sure you are not part of the branch which you wish to delete or else you will get this error:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git switch issue-6291
Switched to branch 'issue-6291'

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --delete issue-6291
error: Cannot delete branch 'issue-6291' checked out at '/home/deepak/git_examples'

As you can see, I switched to issue-6291 branch and then trying to delete the same branch leads to an ERROR.

So to delete the branch, you must checkout as a different branch first.

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git switch main
Switched to branch 'main'
Your branch is ahead of 'origin/main' by 2 commits.
  (use "git push" to publish your local commits)

Check your current branch:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch
  issue-5632
  issue-6291
  issue-9538
* main
  my-feature-branch

Now try to delete your branch:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --delete issue-6291
Deleted branch issue-6291 (was e126b0b).

Scenario-2: Fix error: The branch ‘XXX’ is not fully merged.

Let us try to delete another of our local branch:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --delete issue-5632
error: The branch 'issue-5632' is not fully merged.

If you are sure you want to delete it, run ‘git branch -D issue-5632‘. This error is caused because we have some un-merged changes in branch issue-5632 due to which the branch delete has failed.

ALSO READ: Git rename branch — local and remote (PROPERLY)

In such case either you can delete the branch forcefully or merge the changes and then perform the delete operation.

Solution-1: Perform merge and delete git branch

I will push these changes to a new branch issue-5632 on the remote gitlab server.

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git push origin issue-5632
Enumerating objects: 5, done.
Counting objects: 100% (5/5), done.
Compressing objects: 100% (2/2), done.
Writing objects: 100% (4/4), 319 bytes | 159.00 KiB/s, done.
Total 4 (delta 1), reused 0 (delta 0), pack-reused 0
remote:
remote: To create a merge request for issue-5632, visit:
remote:   https://gitlab.com/golinuxcloud/git_examples/-/merge_requests/new?merge_request%5Bsource_branch%5D=issue-5632
remote:
To gitlab.com:golinuxcloud/git_examples.git
 * [new branch]      issue-5632 -> issue-5632

This will create a merge request with main branch and will also create a new branch on the remote server.

To merge this into main branch, switch to main branch:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git switch main
Switched to branch 'main'
Your branch is ahead of 'origin/main' by 2 commits.
  (use "git push" to publish your local commits)

Check your current branch

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch
  issue-5632
  issue-9538
* main
  my-feature-branch

Merge issue-5632 branch into main

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git merge issue-5632
Updating e126b0b..cf00196
Fast-forward
 test-5632/patch-1 | 0
 1 file changed, 0 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
 create mode 100644 test-5632/patch-1

Verify the git log to confirm the merge:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git log --oneline
cf00196 (HEAD -> main, origin/issue-5632, issue-5632) Added patch-1
e126b0b (origin/my-feature-branch, my-feature-branch, issue-9538) Adding new group
5e04f57 Created new script to add groups
1b6369c (origin/main, origin/HEAD) Added create_users.sh script
6297a37 Updated script2.sh in main branch
...

Now you can go ahead and delete the local branch:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --delete issue-5632
Deleted branch issue-5632 (was cf00196).

ALSO READ: git branch management with examples [Beginners]

Solution-2: Forcefully delete local branch

If you do not wish to merge your changes, then you can forcefully delete the branch locally using --delete --force or -D:

So you can use:

git branch --delete --force <branch_to_be_deleted>

OR

git branch -D <branch_to_be_deleted>

Git delete branch remotely

To delete a branch from the remote, use any of the following syntax:

git push origin --delete <branch>   # Git version 1.7.0 or newer
git push origin -d <branch>         # Shorter version (Git 1.7.0 or newer)
git push origin :<branch>           # Git versions older than 1.7.0

Following are the list of remotely available branches on my gitlab server:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --remotes
  origin/HEAD -> origin/main
  origin/issue-5632
  origin/main
  origin/my-feature-branch

These are the list of locally available branch:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch
* issue-9538
  main
  my-feature-branch

Scenario-1: When branch is available only on the remote (not locally)

Since, issue-5632 branch is available only on the remote server as we have already deleted it on the local repo. To delete this branch also from the remote we will use:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git push origin --delete issue-5632
To gitlab.com:golinuxcloud/git_examples.git
 - [deleted]         issue-5632

Verify the list of branch on the remote to make sure your branch was deleted successfully:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --remotes
  origin/HEAD -> origin/main
  origin/main
  origin/my-feature-branch

ALSO READ: Move content from one git repo to another [5 simple steps]

Scenario-2: When there are un-merged changes locally

I have pushed issue-9538 to the remote gitlab server, so now this branch is also available on the remote:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --remotes
  origin/HEAD -> origin/main
  origin/issue-9538
  origin/main
  origin/my-feature-branch

I will commit some changes into this branch, but will not merge it with main branch:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch
* issue-9538
  main
  my-feature-branch

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git add bugs/patch-9538

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git commit -m "added patch for #9538" -a
[issue-9538 d850184] added patch for #9538
 1 file changed, 0 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
 create mode 100644 bugs/patch-9538

Let’s try to delete this branch on the remote repo server:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git push origin --delete issue-9538
To gitlab.com:golinuxcloud/git_examples.git
 - [deleted]         issue-9538

So, even though I was in issue-9538 branch and there were un-merged changes, but still the remote branch was successfully deleted. So these factors do not matter if we wish to delete remote branch.

With this step, the remote branch has been deleted but the local branch is still there along with the un-merged changes:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch
* issue-9538
  main
  my-feature-branch

So we must delete this branch locally as explained in section one of this article.

Delete git branch both locally and remotely

We have covered this topic separately, now lets understand the flow which should be followed when trying to delete a branch from both local and remote git server.

ALSO READ: git undo commit before push [Practical Examples]

In my case my-feature-branch is available on both local and remote git server:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch
* issue-9538
  main
  my-feature-branch

Step-1: Switch to alternate branch

Make sure you are on a different branch and not in the one you plan to delete. To switch your branch you can use:

git checkout <different_branch>

OR

git switch <different_branch>

Since we are already on a different branch, we will ignore this step.

Step-2: Delete branch on the remote

Next we will delete the branch on the remote server first:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git push origin --delete my-feature-branch
To gitlab.com:golinuxcloud/git_examples.git
 - [deleted]         my-feature-branch

As you can verify, now my-feature-branch is deleted from remote but is still available locally:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --all
* issue-9538
  main
  my-feature-branch
  remotes/origin/HEAD -> origin/main
  remotes/origin/main

Step-3: Delete branch locally

Now we can delete our branch locally. Since the remote branch is already deleted, we can safely use --delete --force or -D to perform a force delete of the git branch:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --delete --force my-feature-branch
Deleted branch my-feature-branch (was e126b0b).

Verify the list of branch:

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git branch --all
* issue-9538
  main
  remotes/origin/HEAD -> origin/main
  remotes/origin/main

Step-4: Pruning the obsolete local remote-tracking branch

Note that deleting X remote branch from the command line using a git push will also remove the local remote-tracking branch origin/X, so it is necessary to prune the obsolete remote-tracking branch with git fetch --prune or git fetch -p.

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git switch main
Switched to branch 'main'

Perform a fetch on other machines after deleting remote branch, to remove obsolete tracking branches.

deepak@ubuntu:~/git_examples$ git fetch --all --prune
Fetching origin

ALSO READ: First Time Git Setup | Git Config Global

Summary

In this article we discussed in depth about different commands using which you can delete git branch both locally and remotely. You can safely remove a branch with git branch -d yourbranch. If it contains unmerged changes (ie, you would lose commits by deleting the branch), git will tell you and won’t delete it.

To delete a remote branch, use git push origin :mybranch, assuming your remote name is origin and the remote branch you want do delete is named mybranch.

Further Readings

git branch

Git delete branch — Are you doing it correctly?

Table of Contents

There can be a couple of scenarios wherein you would wish to delete branch. Following are some of the possible scenarios:

1. Delete git branch locally
2. Delete git branch remotely
3. Delete git branch both locally and globally
4. Perform git merge and Delete git branch

We will cover all these scenarios individually with the best recommendation to do this the right way.

Prepare Environment

I have setup my repository git_examples using GitLab.

Following is my git version:

I will clone my repository from gitlab to my local workstation:

Git delete branch locally

If your branch is only available on your local workstation repository then you must follow this section. Currently I have following branch in the local repository of my workstation:

To check the list of remote branches (i.e. branch which are available on the remote gitlab server):

So the following branch are only present on my local workstation only but not on the remote:

Since these branches are not available on remote, so I just need to delete them locally.

Scenario-1: Fix error: Cannot delete branch ‘XXX’ checked out at ‘YYY’

To delete a branch locally use the following command syntax:

First step, make sure you are not part of the branch which you wish to delete or else you will get this error:

As you can see, I switched to issue-6291 branch and then trying to delete the same branch leads to an ERROR.

So to delete the branch, you must checkout as a different branch first.

Check your current branch:

Now try to delete your branch:

Scenario-2: Fix error: The branch ‘XXX’ is not fully merged.

Let us try to delete another of our local branch:

If you are sure you want to delete it, run ‘ git branch -D issue-5632 ‘. This error is caused because we have some un-merged changes in branch issue-5632 due to which the branch delete has failed.

In such case either you can delete the branch forcefully or merge the changes and then perform the delete operation.

Solution-1: Perform merge and delete git branch

I will push these changes to a new branch issue-5632 on the remote gitlab server.

This will create a merge request with main branch and will also create a new branch on the remote server.

To merge this into main branch, switch to main branch:

Check your current branch

Merge issue-5632 branch into main

Verify the git log to confirm the merge:

Now you can go ahead and delete the local branch:

Solution-2: Forcefully delete local branch

If you do not wish to merge your changes, then you can forcefully delete the branch locally using —delete —force or -D :

Git delete branch remotely

To delete a branch from the remote, use any of the following syntax:

Following are the list of remotely available branches on my gitlab server:

These are the list of locally available branch:

Scenario-1: When branch is available only on the remote (not locally)

Since, issue-5632 branch is available only on the remote server as we have already deleted it on the local repo. To delete this branch also from the remote we will use:

Verify the list of branch on the remote to make sure your branch was deleted successfully:

Scenario-2: When there are un-merged changes locally

I have pushed issue-9538 to the remote gitlab server, so now this branch is also available on the remote:

I will commit some changes into this branch, but will not merge it with main branch:

Let’s try to delete this branch on the remote repo server:

So, even though I was in issue-9538 branch and there were un-merged changes, but still the remote branch was successfully deleted. So these factors do not matter if we wish to delete remote branch.

With this step, the remote branch has been deleted but the local branch is still there along with the un-merged changes:

So we must delete this branch locally as explained in section one of this article.

Delete git branch both locally and remotely

We have covered this topic separately, now lets understand the flow which should be followed when trying to delete a branch from both local and remote git server.

In my case my-feature-branch is available on both local and remote git server:

Step-1: Switch to alternate branch

Make sure you are on a different branch and not in the one you plan to delete. To switch your branch you can use:

Since we are already on a different branch, we will ignore this step.

Step-2: Delete branch on the remote

Next we will delete the branch on the remote server first:

As you can verify, now my-feature-branch is deleted from remote but is still available locally:

Step-3: Delete branch locally

Now we can delete our branch locally. Since the remote branch is already deleted, we can safely use —delete —force or -D to perform a force delete of the git branch:

Verify the list of branch:

Step-4: Pruning the obsolete local remote-tracking branch

Note that deleting X remote branch from the command line using a git push will also remove the local remote-tracking branch origin/X , so it is necessary to prune the obsolete remote-tracking branch with git fetch —prune or git fetch -p .

Perform a fetch on other machines after deleting remote branch, to remove obsolete tracking branches.

Summary

In this article we discussed in depth about different commands using which you can delete git branch both locally and remotely. You can safely remove a branch with git branch -d yourbranch . If it contains unmerged changes (ie, you would lose commits by deleting the branch), git will tell you and won’t delete it.

To delete a remote branch, use git push origin :mybranch , assuming your remote name is origin and the remote branch you want do delete is named mybranch .

Further Readings

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Источник

How to delete a Git branch locally

Community driven content discussing all aspects of software development from DevOps to design patterns.

• How to delete all Git branches except master or main . – TheServerSide.com
• How to rename and change a Git branch name locally &. – TheServerSide.com
• How to delete a Git repository – TheServerSide.com

Whether you use GitFlow, GitHub Flow or any other branch driven development strategy, you will inevitably end up with a local Git repository filled with branches you no longer need. Which is why it’s good to know the command to delete Git branches locally and permanently so they don’t pollute your local development environment.

To issue the command to delete a local Git branch, follow these steps:

1. Open a Git BASH window or Command Window in the root of your Git repository
2. If necessary, use the git switch or checkout command to move off the branch you wish to delete
3. Issue the

command to delete the local branch

One rule of local Git branch deletion is that you cannot delete a branch that is currently checked out. Otherwise, you run into the ‘cannot delete branch’ error as you can see in the example below:

In the above example, the user tried to delete the main Git branch while the it was checked out, which caused an error. However, deletion of the local Git branches named new-branch 0r old-branch would run without error:

The command to delete a local git branch can take one of two forms:

• git branch –delete old-branch
• git branch -d old-branch

The only difference is the fact that the second local branch delete Git command uses an abbreviated syntax. Both commands do the exact same thing.

It should be noted that when you delete a local Git branch, the corresponding remote branch in a repository like GitHub or GitLab remains alive and active. Further steps must be taken to delete remote branches.

When you delete a local Git branch, the deletion will not be reflected in remote repos like GitHub or GitLab.

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Источник

How To Delete Local Branch In Git?

Git provides the git branch -d command in order to delete the local branch in a git repository. This command accepts the branch name as a parameter which will be deleted. Keep in mind that this command only deletes the local branch and can not be used to delete the remote Git branch.

List Local Branches

Before deleting a branch we can list currently existing branches with the following git branch command. The currently active branch is expressed with the * which is master in the following example.

Delete Local Branch

The default way to delete a local branch in git is using the git branch -d . The -d option is used for delete operation. The long form of the -d option is —delete . The branch which will be deleted is added as a parameter like below. In the following example, we delete the branch named testing .

Alternatively, the log form delete option “–delete” can be used like below.

Delete Local Branch Forcefully

If the branch you want to delete contains commits that haven’t been merged to the local branches or pushed to the remote repository the -d or —delete option does not works. The local branch removal or delete operation can be forced with the -D option.

“error: Cannot delete branch ‘testing’ checked out at”

When we try to delete the currently active branch we get the “error: Cannot delete branch ‘testing’ checked out at” error. This error cause is the branch we want to delete locally is currently active. In order to solve this error and delete the local branch, we should switch to another branch.

So we use the git switch command by providing the branch name we want to switch. In this case, we use the master .

Now we can delete the local branch “testing” without a problem.

Источник

Как удалить локальную и удаленную ветку Git

Ветви — это часть повседневного процесса разработки и одна из самых мощных функций Git. После слияния ветвь она не служит никакой цели, кроме исторических исследований. Обычно рекомендуется удалять ветку после успешного слияния.

В этом руководстве рассказывается, как удалить локальные и удаленные ветки Git.

Удалить локальную ветку Git

Команда git branch позволяет вам перечислять, создавать , переименовывать и удалять ветки.

Чтобы удалить локальную ветку Git, вызовите команду git branch с параметром -d ( —delete ), за которым следует имя ветки:

Если вы попытаетесь удалить ветку, в которой есть не объединенные изменения, вы получите следующее сообщение об ошибке:

Как видно из сообщения выше, чтобы принудительно удалить ветку, используйте параметр -D который является ярлыком для —delete —force :

Обратите внимание: если вы удалите несоединенную ветку, вы потеряете все изменения в этой ветке.

Если вы попытаетесь удалить текущую ветку, вы получите следующее сообщение:

Вы не можете удалить ветку, в которой находитесь. Сначала переключитесь на другую ветку, а затем удалите branch_name :

Удалить удаленную ветку Git

В Git локальная и удаленная ветки — это отдельные объекты. Удаление локальной ветки не удаляет удаленную ветку.

Чтобы удалить удаленную ветку, используйте команду git push с параметром -d ( —delete ):

Где remote_name обычно origin :

Также существует альтернативная команда для удаления удаленной ветки, которую, по крайней мере, для меня запомнить сложнее:

Если вы работаете над проектом с группой людей и пытаетесь удалить удаленную ветку, которая уже удалена кем-то другим, вы получите следующее сообщение об ошибке:

В подобных ситуациях вам необходимо синхронизировать список веток с:

Параметр -p указывает Git перед загрузкой удалить все ссылки удаленного отслеживания, которые больше не существуют в удаленном репозитории.

Выводы

Мы показали вам, как удалить локальную и удаленную ветки Git. Ветви — это в основном ссылка на моментальный снимок ваших изменений и короткий жизненный цикл. После того, как ветка будет объединена с главной (или другой основной веткой), она больше не нужна, и ее следует удалить.

Если вы столкнулись с проблемой или хотите оставить отзыв, оставьте комментарий ниже.

Источник

Ветви — это часть повседневного процесса разработки и одна из самых мощных функций Git. После слияния ветвь она не служит никакой цели, кроме исторических исследований. Обычно рекомендуется удалять ветку после успешного слияния.

В этом руководстве рассказывается, как удалить локальные и удаленные ветки Git.

Удалить локальную ветку Git

Команда git branch позволяет вам перечислять, создавать , переименовывать и удалять ветки.

Чтобы удалить локальную ветку Git, вызовите команду git branch с параметром -d ( --delete ), за которым следует имя ветки:

git branch -d branch_name

Deleted branch branch_name (was 17d9aa0).

Если вы попытаетесь удалить ветку, в которой есть не объединенные изменения, вы получите следующее сообщение об ошибке:

error: The branch 'branch_name' is not fully merged.
If you are sure you want to delete it, run 'git branch -D branch_name'.

Как видно из сообщения выше, чтобы принудительно удалить ветку, используйте параметр -D который является ярлыком для --delete --force :

git branch -D branch_name

Обратите внимание: если вы удалите несоединенную ветку, вы потеряете все изменения в этой ветке.

Если вы попытаетесь удалить текущую ветку, вы получите следующее сообщение:

error: Cannot delete branch 'branch_name' checked out at '/path/to/repository'

Вы не можете удалить ветку, в которой находитесь. Сначала переключитесь на другую ветку, а затем удалите branch_name :

git checkout mastergit branch -d branch_name

Удалить удаленную ветку Git

В Git локальная и удаленная ветки — это отдельные объекты. Удаление локальной ветки не удаляет удаленную ветку.

Чтобы удалить удаленную ветку, используйте команду git push с параметром -d ( --delete ):

git push remote_name --delete branch_name

Где remote_name обычно origin :

git push origin --delete branch_name

...
 - [deleted]         branch_name

Также существует альтернативная команда для удаления удаленной ветки, которую, по крайней мере, для меня запомнить сложнее:

git push origin remote_name :branch_name

Если вы работаете над проектом с группой людей и пытаетесь удалить удаленную ветку, которая уже удалена кем-то другим, вы получите следующее сообщение об ошибке:

error: unable to push to unqualified destination: branch_name The destination refspec neither matches an existing ref on the remote nor begins with refs/, and we are unable to guess a prefix based on the source ref. error: failed to push some refs to '[email protected]:/my_repo'

В подобных ситуациях вам необходимо синхронизировать список веток с:

git fetch -p

Параметр -p указывает Git перед загрузкой удалить все ссылки удаленного отслеживания, которые больше не существуют в удаленном репозитории.

Выводы

Мы показали вам, как удалить локальную и удаленную ветки Git. Ветви — это в основном ссылка на моментальный снимок ваших изменений и короткий жизненный цикл. После того, как ветка будет объединена с главной (или другой основной веткой), она больше не нужна, и ее следует удалить.

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