How to resolve “local edit, incoming delete upon update” message

Question

When I do a svn status ., I get this:

!     C auto-complete-config.elc
      >   local edit, incoming delete upon update
!  +  C auto-complete.el         


        

Answer 1

Short version:

$ svn st
!  +  C foo
      >   local edit, incoming delete upon update
!  +  C bar
      >   local edit, incoming delete upon update
$ touch foo bar
$ svn revert foo bar
$ rm foo bar

If the conflict is about directories instead of files then replace touch with mkdir and rm with rm -r.

---

Note: the same procedure also work for the following situation:

$ svn st
!     C foo
      >   local delete, incoming delete upon update
!     C bar
      >   local delete, incoming delete upon update

---

Long version:

This happens when you edit a file while someone else deleted the file and commited first. As a good svn citizen you do an update before a commit. Now you have a conflict. Realising that deleting the file is the right thing to do you delete the file from your working copy. Instead of being content svn now complains that the local files are missing and that there is a conflicting update which ultimately wants to see the files deleted. Good job svn.

Should svn resolve not work, for whatever reason, you can do the following:

Initial situation: Local files are missing, update is conflicting.

$ svn st
!  +  C foo
      >   local edit, incoming delete upon update
!  +  C bar
      >   local edit, incoming delete upon update

Recreate the conflicting files:

$ touch foo bar

If the conflict is about directories then replace touch with mkdir.

New situation: Local files to be added to the repository (yeah right, svn, whatever you say), update still conflicting.

$ svn st
A  +  C foo
      >   local edit, incoming delete upon update
A  +  C bar
      >   local edit, incoming delete upon update

Revert the files to the state svn likes them (that means deleted):

$ svn revert foo bar

New situation: Local files not known to svn, update no longer conflicting.

$ svn st
?       foo
?       bar

Now we can delete the files:

$ rm foo bar

If the conflict is about directories then replace rm with rm -r.

svn no longer complains:

$ svn st

Done.