Man page 1 : git-lost-found

git-lost-found - Recover lost refs that luckily have not yet been pruned

git lost-found

NOTE: this command is deprecated. Use git-fsck(1) with the option --lost-found instead.

Finds dangling commits and tags from the object database, and creates refs to them in the .git/lost-found/ directory. Commits and tags that dereference to commits are stored in .git/lost-found/commit, and other objects are stored in .git/lost-found/other.

Prints to standard output the object names and one-line descriptions of any commits or tags found.

Suppose you run git tag -f and mistype the tag to overwrite. The ref to your tag is overwritten, but until you run git prune, the tag itself is still there.


    .

$ git lost-found
[1ef2b196d909eed523d4f3c9bf54b78cdd6843c6] GIT 0.99.9c
...

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Also you can use gitk to browse how any tags found relate to each other.


    .

$ gitk $(cd .git/lost-found/commit && echo ??*)

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After making sure you know which the object is the tag you are looking for, you can reconnect it to your regular .git/refs hierarchy.


    .

$ git cat-file -t 1ef2b196
tag
$ git cat-file tag 1ef2b196
object fa41bbce8e38c67a218415de6cfa510c7e50032a
type commit
tag v0.99.9c
tagger Junio C Hamano <junkio@cox.net> 1131059594 -0800
GIT 0.99.9c
This contains the following changes from the "master" branch, since
...
$ git update-ref refs/tags/not-lost-anymore 1ef2b196
$ git rev-parse not-lost-anymore
1ef2b196d909eed523d4f3c9bf54b78cdd6843c6

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Written by Junio C Hamano <\m[blue]\\fR\m[]\s-2\u[1]\d\s+2>

Documentation by Junio C Hamano and the git-list <\m[blue]\\fR\m[]\s-2\u[2]\d\s+2>.

Part of the git(1) suite

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