Pre-Commit Hook Commit Failure Fix | Generated by AI

Home 2026.06 English 中文

---

Here’s the full picture:

The Bug

When ww note watch (or ww note process) creates a note and tries to commit it, the commit can fail if pre-commit hooks modify the file. After failure, the retry is blocked by an uncommitted-changes check, creating an unrecoverable state.

Root Cause — Step by Step

1. process_queue() creates the note file, then calls _git_commit_push(files=created_paths)
2. Inside gitmessageai(), the file is staged with git add <file> (line 87 of gitmessageai.py)
3. The staged diff is sent to the LLM to generate a commit message
4. git commit -m <message> runs — pre-commit hooks fire
5. The end-of-file-fixer hook detects a missing trailing newline and silently fixes the file on disk

6. Now the working tree (fixed) differs from the index (original staging). Git rejects the commit:

   error: Your local changes to the following files would be overwritten by merge
   

7. _git_commit_push() raises CalledProcessError, which propagates up to the except block in process_queue() (line 105-108) — it prints the error and tells you to retry
8. The queue entry is already marked done and cleaned (line 115), but the file is stuck: staged + dirty working tree
9. On retry, _check_uncommitted() (line 51-55) detects the dirty state and calls sys.exit(1) — dead end

The core issue: gitmessageai does git add once at the top, but if hooks modify files during git commit, those modifications aren’t re-staged. The index goes stale.

The Fix

In _git_commit_push() (note_queue_process.py line 31), wrap the gitmessageai() call in a try/except:

try:
    gitmessageai(...)
except subprocess.CalledProcessError:
    # Re-stage files so hook modifications are picked up
    subprocess.run([*git, "add", *files], check=True)
    # Retry once
    gitmessageai(...)

When the first attempt fails because hooks modified files:

• The except block re-runs git add on the same files, staging the hook-fixed versions
• The second gitmessageai() call sees a clean diff (or no diff if hooks were the only change), generates a commit message, and commits successfully

This is safe because:

• Only retries once (no infinite loops)
• If the second attempt also fails, the exception propagates normally
• Covers all pre-commit hooks, not just end-of-file-fixer
• Works for both ww note process and ww note watch (watcher calls process_queue())

Immediate Fix

Manually re-staged the stuck note and committed:

9478ec3f3  docs(notes): add Qwen3.6 unpacked vs hype analysis

The file had already been hook-fixed on disk, so the second commit passed all hooks cleanly.

---

Back Donate