Can't get it to work on Windows

[Slion]

All I get is error: cannot spawn git-filter-repo: Exec format error.
Used Python as provided from Microsoft Store.
Installed git-filter-repo using pip.
Copied script to git folder.
Try run it.
Get error mentioned above.

Tried to change the shebang line, no joy.

[Slion]

Shebang: #!crap
Result: error: cannot spawn git-filter-repo: Exec format error

Shebang: #!C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps\PythonSoftwareFoundation.Python.3.9_qbz5n2kfra8p0\python.exe
Result: error: cannot spawn git-filter-repo: Exec format error

Shebang: #!/usr/bin/env python
Result: /usr/bin/env: 'python': Permission denied

[Slion]

Shebang: #!crap
Result: error: cannot spawn git-filter-repo: Exec format error

Shebang: #!C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps\PythonSoftwareFoundation.Python.3.9_qbz5n2kfra8p0\python.exe
Result: error: cannot spawn git-filter-repo: Exec format error

Shebang: #!/usr/bin/env python
Result: /usr/bin/env: 'python': Permission denied

[newren]

Did you read https://github.com/newren/git-filter-repo/blob/main/INSTALL.md (linked to from the main page) and particularly the NOTES for windows users? Did you try things mentioned in the three links from there?

[Slion]

Did you read https://github.com/newren/git-filter-repo/blob/main/INSTALL.md (linked to from the main page) and particularly the NOTES for windows users? Did you try things mentioned in the three links from there?

I did read through those yes. Did not help though. I did a rebase instead 😁

[devkoa]

Hello there, @Slion you are not right, it works on Windows. In my case i have hundred of git repositories, and i develop and test in Windows system. And i have a quite complex setup. I run python code, i generate a shell script and the shell script calls the git-filter-repo, and all this works well on Windows. So i dont see any issue here.
@newren Thanks, great work.

Solution:
You will need Portable: Python, Git
python_path="path/to/python/python.exe"
git_path="path/to/git/git.exe"
git_filter_repo="path/to/script/git-filter-repo.py" # copy code local first
git_path python_path git_filter_repo "parameters"
or if you are in git bash just run:
python_path git_filter_repo "parameters"

[SteveBenz]

I haven't figured this all the way out, but in Python 3.9.0, which is the one I downloaded from python.org (not the windows store version), it seems that the default instructions of replacing:

#!/usr/bin/env python3

with whatever your version of python is (e.g. mine is 'py'), resulting in:

#!/usr/bin/env py

Don't quite work because I'm pretty sure that 'py' is itself interpreting the '#!' and launching another 'py' process, leaving the machine with an infinitely growing list of 'py' processes... One would think that the way to fix it would be to add '-x' to the shebang line (which causes python to ignore the first line of the file), but I still haven't managed it.

[Andrefei]

@SteveBenz Probably way to late to help you, but as a Windows user I also struggeled for hours trying to get this to work. I entered the same trap as you mention by changing the shebang to #!/usr/bin/env py. Ended up crashing the dev environment as I did not realize my mistake until it was too late... Don't know if this issue is worth adding somewhere @newren

Anyways, what ended up working for me was changing the shebang to #!/usr/bin/env python and running git filter-repo through the Anaconda PowerShell Prompt in Administrator mode as mentioned in #36. I am wondering if this solution could work in a general case, as the Anaconda PowerShell should reach you Python installation in a similar way regardless of installation method or version.

[ViliusS]

@Slion try changing shebang value to #!\python.exe
Worked for me.

Also, don't run cmd shell under Administrator as you won't have rights to access MS Store version of Python (it is installed under user's profile).

[newren]

I updated the INSTALL.md file to point out that folks can just run python3 git-filter-repo instead of trying to get git filter-repo to work. Don't know why Windows makes it so difficult to make the short form magic work, but it's really not necessary.