git fails to detect renaming

Question

One branch (refactoringBranch) had a complete directory restructure. Files were moved chaosly, but the content was preserved.

I tried to merge: git merge --no-ff -Xrename-threshold=15 -Xpatience -Xignore-space-change refactoringBranch

git status shows about half of files renaming recognition. But out of 10000 files in the project half wasn't recognized as moved.

One example would be:

# On branch master
# Changes to be committed:

#   deleted:    404.php
#   new file:   public_html/404.php
    ...
#   deleted:    AnotherFile.php
#   new file:   public_html/AnotherFile.php
    ...
#   renamed:    contracts/css/view.css -> public_html/contracts/css/view.css

Suggestions?

---

Prehistory

The refactoring was made outside of git. I did the following:

1. Created the refactoringBranch originating on master.
2. Dropped the changed structure inside the refactoringBranch, meaning I had my changes in some other dir and just copy-pasted them over my git repository.
3. Added and committed everything and then tried to merge.

This is was my workflow:

git checkout -b refactoringBranch
cp -R other/place/* ./
git add . -A
git commit -a -m "blabla"
git checkout master
git merge --no-ff -Xrename-threshold=15 -Xpatience -Xignore-space-change refactoringBranch

The problem arise on the git add . -A step probably. Because if rename detection was correct there, I'd assume the merge would go flawless.

Answer 1

OS X is case-aware, but not sensitive. Git ?is? case-sensitive. If you changed a file name and the only change was a case change, rename the file back to the way it was, then use git mv to rename instead.