GIT warning: too many files skipping inexact rename detection

git git-merge git-config

I am aware that the default rename limit is 100 and we can increase this value using the config diff.renamelimit config

What I am worried about is that, if this config is not setup, will there be a wrong merge or any missing code? I am trying to merge (git merge) 2 branches that have huge changes.

Can someone throw more light about this config setting?

I had the same experience, and I can confirm the message is simply a warning with no consequences other than a few pesky merge conflicts.

I have this warning on diff command

Hank Gay

Your content is safe.

As I understand it, git doesn't actually have any concept of a first-class rename operation (only bzr does, of the big 3 DVCSs): the mv is sugar on top of the underlying machinery, which is basically an add and a rm. Since git can track the content that changes during such operations, though, it can use heuristics to guess when an add and a rm are actually a mv. Since that takes way more work than just displaying what git actually recorded—the docs for git-diffexplain that it "...require O(n^2) processing time where n is the number of potential rename/copy targets"—git won't try it when too many files are involved. The setting you mention just controls that threshold.

"Your content is safe" - though if the detection misses a file which was renamed on one side of a merge and changed on the other, you'll get merge conflicts which you might not have gotten had the rename been detected. The merge won't be wrong, but it might require more user effort to complete.

Thanks Hank and Jefromi. Will setting up this "diff.renamelimit config" really be useful in any situations?

If someone is wondering too if this setting is useful: yes, it can help you merge branches when in one branch you have moved hundreds of files and in other you made a lot of changes in those files. I had situation like that when I had huge code refactor on one branch and some ongoing work on other.

M3RS

In case this helps anyone, I had a lot of files (hundreds, if not thousands) in one branch, which were not yet in the other branch. Running

$ git config merge.renamelimit 15345

made the below error when merging go away

$ git merge master
.
.
.
warning: inexact rename detection was skipped due to too many files.
warning: you may want to set your merge.renamelimit variable to at least 15345 and retry the command.

Also, after setting the rename limit, before retrying merge, call "git merge --abort" to abort the current merge in progress.

GIT warning: too many files skipping inexact rename detection

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