Error "-c: applet not found" when git should execute external command using MinGit-2.46.0-busybox-64-bit

[dodmi]

• [x] I was not able to find an open or closed issue matching what I'm seeing

Setup

• Which version of Git for Windows are you using? Is it 32-bit or 64-bit? MinGit-2.46.0-busybox-64-bit

  git version 2.46.0.windows.1
  cpu: x86_64
  built from commit: 2e6a859ffc0471f60f79c1256f766042b0d5d17d
  sizeof-long: 4
  sizeof-size_t: 8
  shell-path: D:/git-sdk-64-build-installers/usr/bin/sh
  feature: fsmonitor--daemon
  libcurl: 8.9.0
  OpenSSL: OpenSSL 3.2.2 4 Jun 2024
  zlib: 1.3.1

• Which version of Windows are you running? Vista, 7, 8, 10? Is it 32-bit or 64-bit? Windows 10, x64

  Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.19045.4780]

• What options did you set as part of the installation? Or did you choose the defaults? This is not the installer version

• Any other interesting things about your environment that might be related to the issue you're seeing?

It's working fine with MinGit-2.45.2-busybox-64-bit

Details

• Which terminal/shell are you running Git from? e.g Bash/CMD/PowerShell/other

PowerShell 5

• What commands did you run to trigger this issue? If you can provide a Minimal, Complete, and Verifiable example this will help us understand the issue.

git branch

• What did you expect to occur after running these commands?

I expected a list of branches in my repo

• What actually happened instead?

I get the message -c: applet not found

[dscho]

• What commands did you run to trigger this issue? If you can provide a Minimal, Complete, and Verifiable example this will help us understand the issue.

git branch

This does not reproduce the issue here, it correctly shows the list of branches here.

[dodmi]

Thank you for your quick response. I upgraded from version 2.45.2 to 2.46.0 and didn't change anything else. After you wrote it's working for you, I tried something else: git -P branch is working. But invoking external tools doesn't.

While my settings worked fine with version 2.45.2, git 2.46 seems to have problems to run external programs or reads .gitconfig settings differently.

This worked before:

[core]
pager = \"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Tools\\less.exe\" --clear-screen --tilde
editor = \"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Vim\\vim74\\vim.exe\"

git 2.46.0 neither executes less nor vim as it did before.

[dscho]

This worked before:

[core]
pager = \"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Tools\\less.exe\" --clear-screen --tilde
editor = \"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Vim\\vim74\\vim.exe\"

Aha! This is not part of the standard setup, and therefore a crucial part of the minimal reproducer.

And since the provenance of that C:\Program Files (x86)\Tools is unclear, and since you are obviously using MinGit interactively (which is not the intended use case), the largest part of the investigation is your own responsibility.

Here is a pointer to get you started: call GIT_TRACE=1 git branch to find out what exact command-line is triggering that error message.

If this does not help, you will need to install Git for Windows' SDK and then bisect via sdk cd git && git bisect start v2.46.0.windows.1 v2.45.2.windows.1 etc.

[dodmi]

Well, I set up my MinGIT ages before and simply replaced the MinGIT folder with any new version. Sorry :'( I set up a simple test now and compared the output of MinGIT 2.45.2 with MinGIT 2.46.0 As pager, I've set "notepad.exe" - just for simplicity.

[core]
pager=notepad.exe

With GIT_TRACE=1 I get: MinGIT 2.45

C:\Repo>"c:\Program Files\MinGIT2.45\cmd\git.exe" branch
19:55:31.437448 exec-cmd.c:243          trace: resolved executable dir: C:/Program Files/MinGit2.45/mingw64/bin
19:55:31.453428 git.c:465               trace: built-in: git branch
19:55:31.453428 run-command.c:657       trace: run_command: unset GIT_PAGER_IN_USE; LESS=FRX LV=-c ''\''notepad.exe'\'''

This opens Notepad, as expected.

MinGIT 2.46:

C:\Repo>"c:\Program Files\MinGIT2.46\cmd\git.exe" branch
19:55:42.391835 exec-cmd.c:243          trace: resolved executable dir: C:/Program Files/MinGIT2.46/mingw64/bin
19:55:42.407483 git.c:472               trace: built-in: git branch
19:55:42.407483 run-command.c:667       trace: run_command: unset GIT_PAGER_IN_USE; LESS=FRX LV=-c ''\''notepad.exe'\'''
19:55:42.407483 run-command.c:928       trace: start_command: 'C:/Program Files/MinGIT2.46/mingw64/bin/busybox.exe' -c ''\''notepad.exe'\''' ''\''notepad.exe'\'''
-c: applet not found

It seems, git 2.46 invokes busybox with command line parameter -c, but busybox doesn't support such a parameter, hence the misleading error message. busybox shouldn't be prepended at all.

[dodmi]

There's also an ash.exe in mingw64\bin, which supports -c as command line argument and would work. Can I configure git somewhere to use ash.exe instead of busybox.exe?

[dodmi]

Using package MinGit-2.46.0-64-bit.zip, all works as expected, the problem is somewhere around the integration with busybox

[dodmi]

With MinGit 2.46.1 Busybox x64, something changed. But it's still not working in all cases.

[core]
pager=notepad.exe

and

[core]
pager="C:/Windows/notepad.exe"

work fine now, while it didn't work in 2.46. pager = "C:/Program Files (x86)/Tools/less.exe" or pager = "'C:/Program Files (x86)/Tools/less.exe' --clear-screen --tilde" still don't work and busybox -c is executed.

[dodmi]

Well, I switched to MinGit (without Busybox) and all is working as before now. I'm closing this issue as there seems to be no further interest to solve it.