Commit comments not appearing in Gitlab on CentOS

Last modified: [last-modified]

If you followed my earlier documentation, or simply installed Gitlab yourself on CentOS 6 you might run into this problem:

When you go to the ‘Files’ view of one of your repositories it won’t load any of the commit comments. It just appears to perpetually load.

If you look in your ‘production.log’ you’ll see an error like this:

Processing by RefsController#logs_tree as JS
  Parameters: {"_"=>"1369162443960", "project_id"=>"USERNAME/geoip-lookup", "id"=>"master"}
  Rendered refs/logs_tree.js.haml (57.2ms)
Completed 500 Internal Server Error in 98ms

ActionView::Template::Error (undefined method `committed_date' for nil:NilClass):
    4:
    5:   :plain
    6:     var row = $("table.table_#{@hex_path} tr.file_#{hexdigest(file_name)}");
    7:     row.find("td.tree_time_ago").html('#{escape_javascript time_ago_in_words(commit.committed_date)} ago');
    8:     row.find("td.tree_commit").html('#{escape_javascript render("tree/tree_commit_column", commit: commit)}');
  app/views/refs/logs_tree.js.haml:7:in `block in _app_views_refs_logs_tree_js_haml__4074553552003765415_53128340'
  app/views/refs/logs_tree.js.haml:1:in `each'
  app/views/refs/logs_tree.js.haml:1:in `_app_views_refs_logs_tree_js_haml__4074553552003765415_53128340'

It looks like this is a bug with git itself and not Gitlab.

There is a patch you can manually apply to your Gitlab deployment OR you could just upgrade git to the latest and greatest version. I chose to upgrade git. The below guide assumes you followed my original “How to install Gitlab 5.0 on CentOS 6 or RHEL6” guide. I’ve updated that guide to reflect these new steps.

1. Get logged in to your server and become ‘sa_gitlab’

[root@localhost ~] su - sa_gitlab
[sa_gitlab@localhost~]

 

2. Create a temp directory if you don’t have one and move into it

[sa_gitlab@localhost~] mkdir temp
[sa_gitlab@localhost~] cd temp

 

3. Download the latest source for git from https://code.google.com/p/git-core/downloads/list. As of this writing 1.8.2.3 is the latest version

[sa_gitlab@localhost~] wget -c https://git-core.googlecode.com/files/git-1.8.2.3.tar.gz
[sa_gitlab@localhost~] tar -xf git-1.8.2.3.tar.gz
[sa_gitlab@localhost~] cd git-1.8.2.3

 

4. Configure, compile and install git 1.8.2.3

[sa_gitlab@localhost~] ./configure --prefix=/data/apps/sa_gitlab/git
[sa_gitlab@localhost~] make
[sa_gitlab@localhost~] make install

 

5. Configure your environment so the new version of git overrides the default CentOS version

[sa_gitlab@localhost~] vim ~/.bashrc

# -------- Make the following edits --------

# Change the PATH line to look like this:
PATH=$HOME/git/bin:$HOME/ruby/bin:$PATH:$HOME/bin;

# -------- Save and close the file --------

[sa_gitlab@localhost~] vim ~/.bash_profile

# -------- Make the following edits --------

# Change the PATH line to look like this:
PATH=$HOME/git/bin:$HOME/ruby/bin:$PATH:$HOME/bin;

# -------- Save and close the file --------

 

6. Re-export your path and verify which git is being used and it’s version

[sa_gitlab@localhost~] PATH=$HOME/git/bin:$HOME/ruby/bin:$PATH:$HOME/bin;

[sa_gitlab@localhost~] which git
~/git/bin/git

[sa_gitlab@localhost ~] git --version
git version 1.8.2.3

 

7. Update your gitlab.yml configuration file

[sa_gitlab@micro ~] cd gitlab
[sa_gitlab@micro gitlab] vim config/gitlab.yml

# -------- Make the following edits --------

  git:
    bin_path: /data/apps/sa_gitlab/git/bin/git

# -------- Save and close the file --------

 

8. Restart Gitlab

[sa_gitlab@localhost gitlab] exit

[root@localhost ~] service gitlab stop

# Wait 1-2 minutes for everything to exit

[root@localhost ~] service gitlab start

 

That’s it!

Update May 22nd, 2013 – Added step 7. Didn’t realise you had to edit the gitlab.yml file to point to the new git binary location. I assumed Gitlab used the git binary it found via PATH.