Accidentally stopped command in middle of git checkout how do I recover

Question

I ran git checkout and stopped the process in the middle. Now I can't switch branches because it complains I'll overwrite local files. How do I get around this? eg

git checkout egotailer error: Your local changes to the following files would be overwritten by checkout: ...

I tried

git clean -d -x -f

but it didn't help

Answer 1

well, if you know that your repository is all up to date and that you have nothing outstanding to be checked in, simply reset your branch back to the HEAD.

git reset --hard HEAD

Answer 2

git reset --hard

should do it. HEAD is implied when you don't specify a reference.

WARNING This is the most common way to lose work in Git!!

A safer way to clean your directory is

git stash -u

or

git stash --include-untracked

This will do what git reset --hard does but you can't accidentally lose information. It is only available as of version 1.7.7. Before that you had to

git add -A && git stash

for the same effect.

Later, if you realize you are missing important work, you can get it back from the stash.