'Unable to create '/git/index.lock': File exists - but it doesn't

I'm getting this message when trying to rebase interactively using source tree.

If no other git process is currently running, this probably means a
git process crashed in this repository earlier. Make sure no other git
process is running and remove the file manually to continue.

fatal: Unable to create 'X:/sources/project/.git/index.lock': File exists.

The problem is that X:/sources/project/.git/index.lock doesn't exist

All the other solutions on SO didn't work for me since they all say to remove this file.

Solution 1:^[1]

I'm on a Mac and ran into basically the same issue. When running git rebase -i master, I received an error:

fatal: Unable to create 'path/to/file/.git/index.lock': File exists.

The index.lock file didn't exist in my .git/ directory. But there was an index file (no filetype extension). So I aborted the rebase.

After a ton of searching, I finally decided to just create the file: touch .git/index.lock

I tried rebasing again, but that didn't fix the issue (this time the file really did exist). So I removed it: rm .git/index.lock

That did the trick. The rebase had conflicts this time (which was odd since I aborted the rebase previously), but I just addressed each conflict and then let the rebase continue: git rebase --continue

I hope this helps someone else who ends up in a similar situation.

Solution 2:^[2]

Use rm -rf X:/sources/project/.git/index.lock to remove the lock and save yourself a headache. Also, the index.lock exists, however, the .git folder is hidden. So, use ls -la X:/sources/project/.git to see the content of a hidden folder.

Solution 3:^[3]

I had the same issue using Github Desktop. I watched the .git directory and the index.LOCK file would appear and disappear. It never persisted for long, so was not there to delete. I investigated a little as other solutions online did not work for me and found that comparing permissions to folders that I was able to commit they had one difference: the .git folder that gave me the error had full control like the others, but it was inherited from its parent. I went to properties->security->advanced and removed then re-added the permissions without inheriting them from the parent. After that I was able to commit my changes without an error.

Solution 4:^[4]

OK, this is really strange, but for me, the following worked:

Create the file .git/index.lock from Windows explorer
Delete the file again (from git bash, I don't know if this is important)

Then, the command I was executing (git rebase --continue, in my case) succeeded. I have no idea why this procedure worked, though. This should not make any difference...

Solution 5:^[5]

I disabled indexing of the .git folder and it helped to me to get rid of the message

Sources

This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Overflow and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Source: Stack Overflow

Solution	Source
Solution 1	bjblock
Solution 2	hmofrad
Solution 3	Liquid_IQ
Solution 4	David Tanzer
Solution 5	double-beep

'Unable to create '/git/index.lock': File exists - but it doesn't

Solution 1:[1]

Solution 2:[2]

Solution 3:[3]

Solution 4:[4]

Solution 5:[5]