Where to configure default git branch name

Help
1

I have configured the default branch name with:

programs.git.configExtra = ''
[init]
defaultBranch = main
'';

However, every time I recompile my home manager config it gives me this error:

trace: warning: Using programs.git.extraConfig as a string option is
deprecated and will be removed in the future. Please
change to using it as an attribute set instead.

My question is where should I config this?
I know the attributes can be found in the man page, but I do not know which specific attribute to configure.

1 Like
2

It’s as simple as using

programs.git.configExtra = {
init.defaultBranch = main
}

instead

3

Thank you. This worked when I put main in double quotes.

programs.git.configExtra = {
  init.defaultBranch = "main";
};
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4

The solution didn’t work for me. Turns out configExtra is now extraConfig so this works:

programs.git.extraConfig = {
  init.defaultBranch = "main";
};
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5

the solution above no longer works. looks like it’s renamed to just programs.git.config

programs.git.config.init.defaultBranch = "main";
6

For home-manager users stumbling upon this thread, the correct attribute is called extraConfig. Here’s the config:

programs.git = {
  enable = true;
  
  extraConfig.init.defaultBranch = "main";
};
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7

Man, does this really change this frequently? The correct config now is apparently:

  programs.git = {
    enable = true;
    settings = {
      user = {
        name  = "John Doe";
        email = "johndoe@example.com";
      };
      init.defaultBranch = "main";
    };
  };

or:

programs.git.init.defaultBranch = "main";

Always double check with the NixOs/Git wiki: https://nixos.wiki/wiki/Git

P.S: This post was ranked at the top on Google searches for this topic for me. Better update it.

8

Wrong wiki, the official one is wiki.nixos.org.

Also, the people here are confusing NixOS (programs.git.config) and home-manager config (programs.git.settings) - the options are named differently.

For something this simple, forget wikis, just use the options search.

https://search.nixos.org/options?channel=25.11&query=programs.git.

https://home-manager-options.extranix.com/?query=git.&release=master

This is definitely wrong and doesn’t correspond to either of NixOS / hm.

2 Likes