jdx/mise · error

cannot check staged changes: git is unavailable

Error message

cannot check staged changes: git is unavailable

What it means

staged_paths shells out to git (`git diff --name-only --staged`) to detect files staged for commit so they can be skipped during apply. If no git binary can be located via plumbing_binary(), staged-change detection is impossible and the operation fails rather than risking overwrite of staged work.

Source

Thrown at src/system/history/sync/apply.rs:847

    repo.restored_object_at(&head, &entry.tree_path(path)?)
}

/// Read each containing checkout's index once per preflight, not once per
/// incoming file. Never retain this observation across subsequent validation.
pub(super) fn staged_paths<'a>(paths: impl Iterator<Item = &'a Path>) -> Result<BTreeSet<PathBuf>> {
    let roots: BTreeSet<_> = paths
        .filter_map(|path| {
            path.ancestors()
                .find(|dir| dir.join(".git").exists())
                .map(Path::to_path_buf)
        })
        .collect();
    let mut staged = BTreeSet::new();
    if roots.is_empty() {
        return Ok(staged);
    }
    let Some(git) = crate::git::plumbing_binary() else {
        bail!("cannot check staged changes: git is unavailable");
    };
    for root in roots {
        let mut command = std::process::Command::new(git);
        crate::git::sanitize_git_command(&mut command);
        let output = command
            .arg("-C")
            .arg(&root)
            .args([
                "-c",
                "core.fsmonitor=false",
                "diff",
                "--cached",
                "--name-only",
                "-z",
                "--no-renames",
                "--no-ext-diff",
                "--no-textconv",
                "--",

View on GitHub (pinned to afd2eddd3a)

Solutions

1. Install git (e.g. `apt-get install git`, `brew install git`) or fix PATH so `git` resolves.
2. Verify with `command -v git` in the same shell that runs mise.
3. If staged-change skipping is not needed, stage nothing and ensure the environment provides git on retry.

Example fix

// before (PATH lacking git)
mise pull
// after
export PATH="/usr/bin:$PATH"  # ensure git is reachable
mise pull

if which("git").is_err() {
    // git unavailable: install or fix PATH before pulling
}

if let Err(e) = pull() {
    if e.to_string().contains("git is unavailable") {
        // install git or correct PATH, then retry
    }
}

When it happens

Trigger: Running a pull/apply when `git` is not installed or not discoverable on PATH (git unavailable in the environment mise is managing).

Common situations: Minimal containers or CI images without git; broken PATH in a shell where mise runs; git removed after mise was set up.

Understand the failure class

Background: "not installed", "pip install", "required for": how missing-dependency errors surface across open-source libraries — this error's family across 34 libraries.

Related errors

• cannot determine whether {url} is a setup repository: {reaso
• remote task path is not a regular file or directory: {}
• too many inherited Git configuration entries
• {} is not available: required binary '{binary}' not found; a
• executable identity contains an unsupported environment vari

AI-assisted analysis of jdx/mise@afd2eddd3a (2026-09-09). Data as JSON: /api/errors/ee466ab64263dffc. Report an issue: GitHub.