GIT-LOST-FOUND(1)

NAME
git-lost-found - Recover lost refs that luckily have not yet been pruned

SYNOPSIS
git-lost-found

DESCRIPTION
Finds dangling commits and tags from the object database, and creates refs to them in .git/lost-found/ directory. Commits and tags that dereference to commits go to .git/lost-found/commit and others are stored in .git/lost-found/other directory.

OUTPUT
One line description from the commit and tag found along with their object name are printed on the standard output.

EXAMPLE
Suppose you run git tag -f and mistyped the tag to overwrite. The ref to your tag is overwritten, but until you run git prune, it is still there.

$ git lost-found
[1ef2b196d909eed523d4f3c9bf54b78cdd6843c6] GIT 0.99.9c
Also you can use gitk to browse how they relate to each other and existing (probably old) tags.

$ gitk $(cd .git/lost-found/commit && echo ??*)
After making sure that it is the object you are looking for, you can reconnect it to your regular .git/refs hierarchy.

$ git cat-file -t 1ef2b196
tag
$ git cat-file tag 1ef2b196
object fa41bbce8e38c67a218415de6cfa510c7e50032a
type commit
tag v0.99.9c
tagger Junio C Hamano <junkio@cox.net> 1131059594 -0800
GIT 0.99.9c
This contains the following changes from the "master" branch, since
$ git update-ref refs/tags/not-lost-anymore 1ef2b196
$ git rev-parse not-lost-anymore
1ef2b196d909eed523d4f3c9bf54b78cdd6843c6

AUTHOR
Written by Junio C Hamano 濱野 純 <junkio@cox.net>

DOCUMENTATION
Documentation by Junio C Hamano and the git-list <git@vger.kernel.org>.

GIT
Part of the git(7) suite