git config: report when trying to modify a non-existing repo config

It is a pilot error to call `git config section.key value` outside of
any Git worktree. The message

	error: could not lock config file .git/config: No such file or
	directory

is not very helpful in that situation, though. Let's print a helpful
message instead.

Signed-off-by: Johannes Schindelin <johannes.schindelin@gmx.de>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>

diff --git a/builtin/config.c b/builtin/config.c
index adc7727..78aab95 100644 (file)
--- a/builtin/config.c
+++ b/builtin/config.c
@@ -352,6 +352,9 @@ static int get_colorbool(const char *var, int print)
 
 static void check_write(void)
 {
+       if (!given_config_source.file && !startup_info->have_repository)
+               die("not in a git directory");
+
        if (given_config_source.use_stdin)
                die("writing to stdin is not supported");
 

diff --git a/t/t1308-config-set.sh b/t/t1308-config-set.sh
index 91235b7..9863d0d 100755 (executable)
--- a/t/t1308-config-set.sh
+++ b/t/t1308-config-set.sh
@@ -218,4 +218,15 @@ test_expect_success 'check line errors for malformed values' '
        test_i18ngrep "fatal: .*alias\.br.*\.git/config.*line 2" result
 '
 
+test_expect_success 'error on modifying repo config without repo' '
+       mkdir no-repo &&
+       (
+               GIT_CEILING_DIRECTORIES=$(pwd) &&
+               export GIT_CEILING_DIRECTORIES &&
+               cd no-repo &&
+               test_must_fail git config a.b c 2>err &&
+               grep "not in a git directory" err
+       )
+'
+
 test_done