Can't reset a file to a specific commit using Git

Question

I have a modified file which I want to rever to whatever is in the latest commit but it's "stuck" there always being marked as modified.

$ git status
# On branch master
# Changed but not updated:
#   (use "git add <file>..." to update what will be committed)
#   (use "git checkout -- <file>..." to discard changes in working directory)
#
#       modified:   index.php
#
no changes added to commit (use "git add" and/or "git commit -a")

I then try:

$git checkout -- index.php

But the output of git status is still the same. I then try:

$git reset --hard master
HEAD is now at 02c9613 test commit message

And the output of git status is STILL the same.

Any ideas on how I can get rid of the supposed changes on that file?

Answer 1

You might be running into a whitespace issue try git config --global apply.whitespace nowarn for that.

If that doesn't work, I'd say you've run into a bug. Save the local clone for future reference (I hope it's not too big) and create a bug report. Especially the facts that:

• you haven't modified the file yourself
• other files don't show this problem

are signs that it might just not be you that made the mistake here. Whether you can reproduce the problem on a clean repo would be interesting information too.

Answer 2

You have to remove index.php from the "index." Then can you checkout a different version.

git rm --cached index.php

Should do the trick. See:

http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/git-rm.html