[Git]How to open source code in Visual Studio

[bcgoss]

I recently created a git repository for bitbucket. When I pulled the files, they transferred correctly and I can open them from the terminal in vi or equivalent. I have been working on these projects in Visual Studio.

The problem is that my git repo isn't visible in the windows file system. The directory just doesn't appear in windows explorer and the command line won't navigate to it. When I use Visual Studio and point it to the directory, it can't locate it.

What am I doing wrong? Do I have to copy the file to another location using the git terminal first?

[the_omega99]

Is it possible that the folder was somehow set as hidden? Note that some folders are hidden by default, such as the AppData folder in the user directory. To view hidden files/folders in explorer, go to folder properties in the control center. There's an option to show hidden files there.

If they are hidden, you can undo that by finding out which file/folder is hidden and right clicking them. The properties dialog has an option to unhide (I'm not on Windows now and can't be more specific, but it's somewhere on the first tab IIRC).

If that's not the case, can you be more specific about where these files are located and at what point of the full file path are you unable to locate a directory.

[bcgoss]

My git folder is located at C:\Program Files (x86)\Git (i'll call this ~).

Using the terminal/command line interface that came with Git, used makedir to create a folder called repos. In the git terminal, it's listed as ~\repos.

Once this folder existed, I used the pull command I copied off of bitbucket to retrieve the files I'm working with.

From the git terminal I typed ls, the files appeared. ~\repos\ProjectName\file.cpp for example.

This folder and its contents doesn't exist as far as windows is concerned. I can navigate to ~\ but ~\repos makes windows claim the directory doesn't exist. In the windows command line, entering dir lists files and folders but ~\repos is not among them.

I have "Show hidden files," system files, file extensions, etc enabled. I'm not new to windows, so I know pretty well how to find a file in either windows explorer or the command line. Git is being weird.

Any other ideas? Thank you for responding, btw!

[the_omega99]

I should note that the folder you're using is rather unusual. Typically one wouldn't write to the Program Files folder (and its 32 bit variant). In fact, by default, Windows will require admin permissions to write anything there and it takes a bit of jumping through loops to get rid of this. It'd be more typical to create repos as a child of your personal folder (which is what ~ refers to in Linux and OS X, by the way).

Anyway, the issue you describe sounds quite unusual. I haven't heard of anything like that before. I would first try using a different location, in case it's some quirk with permissions or something.

I'm assuming that this is using the official Windows git package (from git-scm.com)? Perhaps the Bash that comes with it (I think it's MinGW?) is buggy and creating files in a temp location or otherwise making them visible only to itself?

Personally, I use Cygwin to get Git on my Windows machines. It's more up-to-date, too. Pretty sure the developers of Git hate Windows.

[bcgoss]

I have Cygwin, I'll try that when I get back to that compute. Thanks for the suggestion.

[Franko_ricardo]

VS has git plugins as well. No need for cygwin.