apache/iceberg · error · Exception

Neither version.txt nor git version exists

Error message

Neither version.txt nor git version exists

What it means

getJavadocVersion falls back to the git branch name for Javadoc versioning; if versionDetails() throws NullPointerException (no git metadata), it throws Exception stating that neither version.txt nor git version exists. The build environment lacks any version source.

Source

Thrown at build.gradle:1243

      // bump the MINOR version and always set the PATCH version to 0
      return matcher.group(1) + "." + (Integer.valueOf(matcher.group(2)) + 1) + ".0-SNAPSHOT"
    }
    return version
  } catch (Exception e) {
    throw new Exception("Neither version.txt nor git version exists: " + e.getMessage(), e)
  }
}

String getJavadocVersion() {
  if (versionFileExists()) {
    return getVersionFromFile()
  }

  try {
    // use the branch name in place of version in Javadoc
    return versionDetails().branchName
  } catch (NullPointerException e) {
    throw new Exception("Neither version.txt nor git version exists")
  }
}

apply from: 'jmh.gradle'
apply from: 'baseline.gradle'
apply from: 'deploy.gradle'
apply from: 'tasks.gradle'

project(':iceberg-bom') {
  apply plugin: 'java-platform'

  dependencies {
    constraints {
      // The Iceberg-Build builds for only one Scala version at a time, so the BOM would also
      // only contain artifacts for that single Scala version. The following code ensures that
      // the BOM references the artifacts for all Scala versions.
      def sparkScalaPattern = ~"(.*)-([0-9][.][0-9]+)_([0-9][.][0-9]+)"
      def sparkScalaVersions = [

View on GitHub (pinned to 86d9c8fc54)

Solutions

1. Ensure the workspace is a proper git checkout with branch information (unshallow if needed)
2. Provide version.txt so the version file path is used instead of git
3. Export CI branch info and ensure the gradle-git-version plugin can read it
4. Verify GIT_BRANCH/branch environment for CI shallow clones

Example fix

// before: git fetch --depth=1 (no branch info)
// after
git fetch --unshallow && git checkout main

if [ ! -d .git ] && ! git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD 2>/dev/null; then
  echo "Git branch info unavailable; provide version.txt"; exit 1
fi

When it happens

Trigger: Generating Javadoc (or any task invoking getJavadocVersion) in a directory without .git and without version.txt, where versionDetails branchName lookup fails with NPE.

Common situations: Source archives without git metadata; CI checkouts with depth=1 and detached head lacking branch info; nightly builds in stripped-down workspaces.

Understand the failure class

Background: "File not found" and ENOENT errors: why libraries can't find a file that should exist — this error's family across 50 libraries.

Related errors

• This build must be run with JDK 17 or 21 but was executed wi
• Neither version.txt nor git version exists:
• Expected a Spark/Scala version combination in Gradle project
• Releases must be built with Java 17
• The JMH benchmarks must be run with JDK 17 or JDK 21

AI-assisted analysis of apache/iceberg@86d9c8fc54 (2026-09-12). Data as JSON: /api/errors/67260f6b5b5ad254. Report an issue: GitHub.