pcottle/learnGitBranching · info · CommandResult

<dynamic describe output: foundTag>

Error message

<dynamic describe output: foundTag>

What it means

Not a real failure: describe returns its result by throwing a CommandResult whose msg is exactly the nearest tag name (foundTag). This is the framework's control-flow mechanism for producing command output, used when the target commit is itself tagged (numAway is empty).

Source

Thrown at src/js/git/index.js:2800

    }
    // ok keep going
    numAway.push(popped.get('id'));

    var parents = popped.get('parents');
    if (parents && parents.length) {
      pQueue = pQueue.concat(parents);
      pQueue.sort(this.dateSortFunc);
    }
  }

  if (!foundTag) {
    throw new GitError({
      msg: intl.todo('Fatal: no tags found upstream')
    });
  }

  if (numAway.length === 0) {
    throw new CommandResult({
      msg: foundTag
    });
  }

  // then join
  throw new CommandResult({
    msg: foundTag + '-' + numAway.length + '-g' + startCommit.get('id')
  });
};

GitEngine.prototype.renameBranch = function(oldName, newName, force) {
  var target = this.resolveID(oldName);

  if (!target || target.get('type') !== 'branch') {
    throw new GitError({
      msg: intl.todo('fatal: not a branch: ' + oldName)
    });
  }

View on GitHub (pinned to 5b09d0ff96)

Solutions

1. No fix needed — this is the successful describe output
2. Catch CommandResult (not GitError) in calling code to read the message

try { engine.describe(ref); } catch (e) { if (e instanceof CommandResult) { display(e.msg); } else throw e; }

When it happens

Trigger: Running describe on a commit that has a tag directly on it — the walk finds the tag immediately and there are zero commits between, so output is just the tag name.

Common situations: Any git describe on a tagged commit; expected, informational output.

Related errors

• <dynamic describe output: foundTag-N-g<id>>
• commit.getShowEntry()
• fatal: No tags found, cannot describe anything.
• <dynamic branch listing>
• <dynamic tag listing>

AI-assisted analysis of pcottle/learnGitBranching@5b09d0ff96 (2026-08-27). Data as JSON: /api/errors/9a8ecc428cc145ba. Report an issue: GitHub.