Can't pop git stash, 'Your local changes to the following files would be overwritten by merge'

Question

So I had a load of changes and some untracked files. I needed to tweak something, so I used git stash -u, modified a couple of things, committed those changes, pushed them, and then tried to git stash pop.

Because I'd modified a couple of files that I'd stashed, I got the following message:

error: Your local changes to the following files would be overwritten by merge:
    file_1.py
    file_2.py
Please, commit your changes or stash them before you can merge.
Aborting

This seems odd, I had committed all new changes, my checkout was clean when I ran the command.

It seems the git stash pop operation un-stashed half of my changes and the untracked files, but if I try and git stash pop again I get output like:

some_file.html already exists, no checkout
some_other_file.html already exists, no checkout
yet_another_file.html already exists, no checkout
Could not restore untracked files from stash

git stash show still shows a list of my stashed changes, but I'm at a loss as to what I do now.

How can I get myself unstuck?

Answer 1

I got around this, I think it must have been some kind of bug, as my working directory was clean and up to date.

I ran git checkout . and after that git stash apply worked fine, I got everything back no problems at all. I'd be interested to work out what actually caused it to fail though.

Answer 2

For those who do have un-committed work, and want to pop their stash without losing that work, here is a way (with thanks to @iFreilicht):

1. Temporarily stage any uncommitted changes:

    git add -u .
   

2. Now you can apply your stash without git complaining (hopefully):

    git stash pop
   

3. Now unstage everything, but leave the files as they are now:

    git reset
   

If step 2 couldn't patch cleanly due to conflicting changes, then you will need to resolve the conflicts manually. git diff should help you find them.

Answer 3

The stash that was made with -u needs to have the untracked files cleaned away before being apply-ed (and pop is just apply+drop).

Out of general paranoia I'd mv the untracked files somewhere safe, then git stash apply, check everything carefully, and git stash drop once I'm sure I have it all correct. :-)

Answer 4

None of these solutions worked for me. I was using git stash index command to restore a specific stash id. So, I ended up doing a commit of my local changes to local repo. Then git stash index worked for me. And finally I rolled back my commit using git reset (with keep changes). Problem solved.