Cannot launch git gui using cygwin on windows

Question

I used to launch git gui within my cygwin console without any problems but since I updated cygwin I\'ve got the following error message:

$ git gui
Applicatio         


        

Answer 1

Avoid X11 and add git gui support to cygwin

If you want to avoid X11 (and who wouldn't?):

1. Install Git for Windows (non-cygwin) http://git-scm.com/download/win
2. Open its command shell C:\Program Files (x86)\Git\Git Bash
3. run git gui

(optional) If you want to stay in cygwin to launch git gui, add a function in your ~/.bashrc to do it. The only caveat is do not name the function git because of recursion and confusion with arguments, and the fact that you're Git for Windows shell may also be adding the same function when it starts. You may also run into path issues so be careful about setting up your paths correctly.

# call git gui from Git For Windows path with `ggui`
    gg() { 
    command "/cygdrive/c/Program Files (x86)/Git/bin/git" gui  2>/dev/null;


    }

When you're done editing your .bashrc, refresh your settings:

source ~./bashrc

and then simply:

gg

Answer 2

After spending more time than I'd care to admit, I managed to find a working solution to execute gitk from my cygwin shell. I couldn't get any of the instructions with starting the X server to work reliably, and in the end, the solution was pretty simple.

The largest caveat is needing to have Git for Windows installed, the download for that can be found here.

Now for the whole running gitk part. Git for windows includes a cmd folder, that has a gitk.cmd windows command file. That's all you need to call to have gitk open.

$ [path-to-git]/cmd/gitk.cmd

On my system the Git path is in "C:\Program Files (x86)\Git" so the command would look like this:

$ "/cygdrive/c/Program Files (x86)/Git/cmd/gitk.cmd"

In my ~/.bash_profile I've added a function to handle that call which looks like this:

gitk() {
  "/cygdrive/c/Program Files (x86)/Git/cmd/gitk.cmd"
}

Hope this helps someone else trying to figure this piece out.

Answer 3

Here is what worked for me:

cat >> ~/.bash_profile <<< "export DISPLAY=:0.0"

From cygwin package manager, do the following:

install xorg-server and some xorg fonts, xorg-x11-fonts-Type1 especially

Next create a link to windows font folders for git gui to use

ln -s /cygdrive/c/Windows/Fonts /usr/share/fonts/win-fonts

Close the cygwin terminal and open again then type

startxwin &> /dev/null &

git gui &

Answer 4

After following the 4 steps given by me_and and tititou36, you may still have issues of the XWin just die after you started the XwinServer.

The reason is it relies on a CygWin terminal/console, which is the host, and the Xwin dies if there is no CygWin console.

The solution for this is:

Start a Cygwin console. (you can make it automatically start by putting mintty command into the file .startxwinrc under your cygwin home directory.

Answer 5

echo "export DISPLAY=:0.0" >>~/.profile

or

echo "export DISPLAY=:0.0" >>~/.bash_profile

in my case

Answer 6

Based on AndrewD's answer: Use cygwin's git, but use Windows Git's gitk and git gui. In other words, uninstall the git-gui and gitk packages from cygwin (if installed). Then which gitk should point to the Windows file, not the cygwin binary in /usr/bin.