Subject: [PATCH 1/4] mingw_open_existing: handle directories better

From: "Matthias Aßhauer via GitGitGadget" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 2025 21:25:15 +0000

From: =?UTF-8?q?Matthias=20A=C3=9Fhauer?= <[email-masked]>

CreateFileW() requires FILE_FLAG_BACKUP_SEMANTICS to create a directory
handle [1] and errors out with ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED without this flag.
Fall back to accessing Directory handles this way.

[1] https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/fileapi/nf-fileapi-createfilew#directories

This fixes https://github.com/git-for-windows/git/issues/5068

Signed-off-by: Matthias Aßhauer <[email-masked]>
---
 compat/mingw.c | 21 ++++++++++++++++-----
 1 file changed, 16 insertions(+), 5 deletions(-)

diff --git a/compat/mingw.c b/compat/mingw.c
index 5d69ae32f4b9..2dd5cbcaee0d 100644
--- a/compat/mingw.c
+++ b/compat/mingw.c
@@ -588,13 +588,24 @@ static int mingw_open_existing(const wchar_t *filename, int oflags, ...)
 			     &security_attributes, OPEN_EXISTING, FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL, NULL);
 	if (handle == INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE) {
 		DWORD err = GetLastError();
+		if (err == ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED) {
+			DWORD attrs = GetFileAttributesW(filename);
+			if (attrs != INVALID_FILE_ATTRIBUTES && (attrs & FILE_ATTRIBUTE_DIRECTORY))
+				handle = CreateFileW(filename, access,
+							FILE_SHARE_WRITE | FILE_SHARE_READ | FILE_SHARE_DELETE,
+							&security_attributes, OPEN_EXISTING, FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL| FILE_FLAG_BACKUP_SEMANTICS, NULL);
+		}
 
-		/* See `mingw_open_append()` for why we have this conversion. */
-		if (err == ERROR_INVALID_PARAMETER)
-			err = ERROR_PATH_NOT_FOUND;
+		if (handle == INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE) {
+			err = GetLastError();
 
-		errno = err_win_to_posix(err);
-		return -1;
+			/* See `mingw_open_append()` for why we have this conversion. */
+			if (err == ERROR_INVALID_PARAMETER)
+				err = ERROR_PATH_NOT_FOUND;
+
+			errno = err_win_to_posix(err);
+			return -1;
+		}
 	}
 
 	fd = _open_osfhandle((intptr_t)handle, oflags | O_BINARY);
-- 
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