I tried the git reset --hard HEAD@{n}
from git reflog
and I lost everything with my current unstaged files :'(
the unstaged files is the last git add
I did, before then I tried git reset
to the last git commit
.
And all my files gone, I can't go back to the git add
before last commit :'(
It's not clear if you lost files in your working directory, or files in
the index. You say you lost your "unstaged files", but then you mention
you might have run "git add". "unstaged files" are lost for good.
Staged files can be recovered with
git fsck --full --unreachable --no-reflog
For each file added there will be a lost blob object, and for each
directory entry there will be a tree object. You would recover your
file changes by doing
git cat-file -p SHA
For each file that you had modified
(master)$ vi bar
(master)$ vi baz
(master)$ vi foo
(master)$ git add foo bar baz
(master)$ git reset --hard HEAD
HEAD is now at ead8fa2 initial
(master)$ git fsck --full --unreachable --no-reflog
Checking object directories: 100% (256/256), done.
unreachable blob 0c29287001b29159f11c4e8a320bce7e9789c00b
unreachable blob 1524d3478e3d0b92866a53239b10bcd4b3838c4d
unreachable blob 97b724e770249816c61d8a526415986208ed7e15
// take a look at one of the objects
(master)git cat-file -p 0c29287001b29159f11c4e8a320bce7e9789c00b
changes for bar
//Here, based on inspecting the output, I can determine that 0c29287 was the file "bar"
(master) git cat-file -p 0c29287 > bar
(note I didn't get any lost trees when I tested, so this part may not work)
If you modified a whole bunch of files it is probably easier to recover
via the tree object instead of individual files
git read-tree SHA
Where SHA is the lost tree object for the root tree.
All unstaged/uncommited files will be deleted with git reset --hard
Using --hard is not recomended since that option removes ALL unstaged/uncommited files, instead you should stash first and then use normal reset
Instead of
git reset --hard HEAD@{n}
You should do
git stash
git reset HEAD@{n}
Your code is then saved in the stash stack, you can retrieve it again by doing
git stash pop
Although this command merge the "stashed" changes with their current HEAD (an stash is implemented like a branch) is recommended to do stash retrievals on the same commits where these stashes was generated
If you have staged the files with git add
, it can still be found back. But if the files are not staged, I have to say there's no way. :(
Just remember that git reset
is really not safe, especially for the unstaged files.
But if the files are really really important, what I can think of is that you may stop modifying any data in your disk, and try disk recovery with the tools such as finaldata
. It might find something back if lucky, because you have already overwritten some files after git reset
.
Anyway, Git
is really a powerful and cool tool if you are familiar with it.
Low tech tip which might be useful for some. If the unstaged/uncommited files that you lost, where open in your editor. Try doing undo on that file and you should get "previous versions" of the file from the editors history stack.
If anyone made the same blunder like me git reset --hard
before adding unstaged files then there are still chances to get those changes back. Although these files are not available in repo anymore but some of the new IDEs maintain their own history. Like in my case I was able to retrieve my unstaged changes from Android Studio's local history feature which is located under VCS.
Directions to Revert Changes