refs.c: allow listing and deleting badly named refs

We currently do not handle badly named refs well:

  $ cp .git/refs/heads/master .git/refs/heads/master.....@\*@\\.
  $ git branch
    fatal: Reference has invalid format: 'refs/heads/master.....@*@\.'
  $ git branch -D master.....@\*@\\.
    error: branch 'master.....@*@\.' not found.

Users cannot recover from a badly named ref without manually finding
and deleting the loose ref file or appropriate line in packed-refs.
Making that easier will make it easier to tweak the ref naming rules
in the future, for example to forbid shell metacharacters like '`'
and '"', without putting people in a state that is hard to get out of.

So allow "branch --list" to show these refs and allow "branch -d/-D"
and "update-ref -d" to delete them.  Other commands (for example to
rename refs) will continue to not handle these refs but can be changed
in later patches.

Details:

In resolving functions, refuse to resolve refs that don't pass the
git-check-ref-format(1) check unless the new RESOLVE_REF_ALLOW_BAD_NAME
flag is passed.  Even with RESOLVE_REF_ALLOW_BAD_NAME, refuse to
resolve refs that escape the refs/ directory and do not match the
pattern [A-Z_]* (think "HEAD" and "MERGE_HEAD").

In locking functions, refuse to act on badly named refs unless they
are being deleted and either are in the refs/ directory or match [A-Z_]*.

Just like other invalid refs, flag resolved, badly named refs with the
REF_ISBROKEN flag, treat them as resolving to null_sha1, and skip them
in all iteration functions except for for_each_rawref.

Flag badly named refs (but not symrefs pointing to badly named refs)
with a REF_BAD_NAME flag to make it easier for future callers to
notice and handle them specially.  For example, in a later patch
for-each-ref will use this flag to detect refs whose names can confuse
callers parsing for-each-ref output.

In the transaction API, refuse to create or update badly named refs,
but allow deleting them (unless they try to escape refs/ and don't match
[A-Z_]*).

Signed-off-by: Ronnie Sahlberg <sahlberg@google.com>
Signed-off-by: Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>

1 files changed, 15 insertions, 2 deletions

diff --git a/cache.h b/cache.h
index b735f3f1e3..0501f7dca8 100644
--- a/cache.h
+++ b/cache.h
@@ -981,16 +981,29 @@ extern int read_ref(const char *refname, unsigned char *sha1);
  * If flags is non-NULL, set the value that it points to the
  * combination of REF_ISPACKED (if the reference was found among the
  * packed references), REF_ISSYMREF (if the initial reference was a
- * symbolic reference) and REF_ISBROKEN (if the ref is malformed).
+ * symbolic reference), REF_BAD_NAME (if the reference name is ill
+ * formed --- see RESOLVE_REF_ALLOW_BAD_NAME below), and REF_ISBROKEN
+ * (if the ref is malformed or has a bad name). See refs.h for more detail
+ * on each flag.
  *
  * If ref is not a properly-formatted, normalized reference, return
  * NULL.  If more than MAXDEPTH recursive symbolic lookups are needed,
  * give up and return NULL.
  *
- * errno is set to something meaningful on error.
+ * RESOLVE_REF_ALLOW_BAD_NAME allows resolving refs even when their
+ * name is invalid according to git-check-ref-format(1).  If the name
+ * is bad then the value stored in sha1 will be null_sha1 and the two
+ * flags REF_ISBROKEN and REF_BAD_NAME will be set.
+ *
+ * Even with RESOLVE_REF_ALLOW_BAD_NAME, names that escape the refs/
+ * directory and do not consist of all caps and underscores cannot be
+ * resolved. The function returns NULL for such ref names.
+ * Caps and underscores refers to the special refs, such as HEAD,
+ * FETCH_HEAD and friends, that all live outside of the refs/ directory.
  */
 #define RESOLVE_REF_READING 0x01
 #define RESOLVE_REF_NO_RECURSE 0x02
+#define RESOLVE_REF_ALLOW_BAD_NAME 0x04
 extern const char *resolve_ref_unsafe(const char *ref, int resolve_flags, unsigned char *sha1, int *flags);
 extern char *resolve_refdup(const char *ref, int resolve_flags, unsigned char *sha1, int *flags);