Install hooks to core.hooksPath instead of refusing by domenkozar · Pull Request #1692 · j178/prek

domenkozar · 2026-02-25T11:20:42Z

Summary

When core.hooksPath is set, install hooks to that directory instead of bailing with "Cowardly refusing"
This makes prek install idempotent and ensures hooks end up where git will actually look for them
If the configured path is not writable, bail with a clear error message

Motivation

Tools like devenv set core.hooksPath to manage git hooks. When prek is used as one of those hooks, running prek install a second time fails because it sees core.hooksPath is already set. The current behavior also means hooks installed to .git/hooks would never run when core.hooksPath points elsewhere.

Instead of refusing, prek should install to the configured path (where git will actually look for hooks). This resolves #23.

Test plan

prek install with core.hooksPath unset works as before
prek install with core.hooksPath set to a writable directory installs hooks there
Running prek install twice with core.hooksPath set succeeds (idempotent)
prek install with core.hooksPath set to a read only directory gives a clear error

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

domenkozar · 2026-02-25T11:22:36Z

@j178 we switched over to prek, but this one is annoying because prek wants to force not setting core.hooksPath but some other tools want to set it.

Copilot

Pull request overview

This PR changes prek install to install hooks to the directory specified by core.hooksPath when set, instead of refusing to proceed with a "Cowardly refusing" error. This resolves issue #23 and makes prek install idempotent when used with tools like devenv that manage git hooks via core.hooksPath.

Changes:

Refactored has_hooks_path_set() to get_hooks_path() which returns the configured path as Option<PathBuf> instead of a boolean
Removed the "cowardly refusing" check that prevented installation when core.hooksPath was set
Added logic to install hooks to the configured core.hooksPath directory with a write permission check

Reviewed changes

Copilot reviewed 2 out of 2 changed files in this pull request and generated 5 comments.

File	Description
crates/prek/src/git.rs	Refactored `has_hooks_path_set()` to `get_hooks_path()` which returns `Option<PathBuf>` with UTF-8 validation
crates/prek/src/cli/install.rs	Removed the "cowardly refusing" check and added logic to install to `core.hooksPath` when set, with write permission validation

prek-ci-bot · 2026-02-25T11:26:37Z

📦 Cargo Bloat Comparison

Binary size change: +0.00% (23.9 MiB → 23.9 MiB)

Expand for cargo-bloat output

Head Branch Results

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 0.3%   0.7% 71.3KiB              prek prek::languages::<impl prek::config::Language>::run::{{closure}}::{{closure}}
 0.3%   0.6% 65.7KiB             prek? <prek::cli::Command as clap_builder::derive::Subcommand>::augment_subcommands
 0.3%   0.6% 65.6KiB              prek prek::languages::<impl prek::config::Language>::run::{{closure}}::{{closure}}
 0.2%   0.5% 51.2KiB annotate_snippets annotate_snippets::renderer::render::render
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 0.1%   0.2% 22.8KiB      serde_saphyr saphyr_parser_bw::scanner::Scanner<T>::fetch_more_tokens
 0.1%   0.2% 22.7KiB              prek <prek::languages::ruby::ruby::Ruby as prek::languages::LanguageImpl>::install::{{closure}}
 0.1%   0.2% 22.3KiB              prek prek::hooks::meta_hooks::MetaHooks::run::{{closure}}
 0.1%   0.2% 22.3KiB              prek prek::hooks::meta_hooks::MetaHooks::run::{{closure}}
 0.1%   0.2% 21.1KiB      clap_builder clap_builder::parser::parser::Parser::get_matches_with
 0.1%   0.2% 20.0KiB               std core::ptr::drop_in_place<prek::languages::<impl prek::config::Language>::install::{{closure}}>
 0.1%   0.2% 19.4KiB   cargo_metadata? <cargo_metadata::_::<impl serde_core::de::Deserialize for cargo_metadata::Package>::deserialize::__Visitor as serde_core::de::Visitor>::visit_map
 0.1%   0.2% 19.2KiB              prek prek::archive::unzip::{{closure}}
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 0.1%   0.2% 18.6KiB              prek prek::cli::run::filter::collect_files_from_args::{{closure}}
38.3%  91.8%  9.2MiB                   And 21170 smaller methods. Use -n N to show more.
41.7% 100.0% 10.0MiB                   .text section size, the file size is 23.9MiB

Base Branch Results

 File  .text    Size             Crate Name
 0.3%   0.7% 71.3KiB              prek prek::languages::<impl prek::config::Language>::run::{{closure}}::{{closure}}
 0.3%   0.7% 66.4KiB             prek? <prek::cli::Command as clap_builder::derive::Subcommand>::augment_subcommands
 0.3%   0.6% 65.6KiB              prek prek::languages::<impl prek::config::Language>::run::{{closure}}::{{closure}}
 0.2%   0.5% 51.2KiB annotate_snippets annotate_snippets::renderer::render::render
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 0.2%   0.4% 41.2KiB              prek prek::cli::run::run::run::{{closure}}
 0.2%   0.4% 38.8KiB              prek prek::run::{{closure}}
 0.1%   0.3% 32.0KiB             prek? <prek::cli::RunArgs as clap_builder::derive::Args>::augment_args
 0.1%   0.3% 28.5KiB      serde_saphyr saphyr_parser_bw::scanner::Scanner<T>::fetch_more_tokens
 0.1%   0.2% 24.7KiB             prek? <prek::config::_::<impl serde_core::de::Deserialize for prek::config::Config>::deserialize::__Visitor as serde_core::de::Visitor>::visit_map
 0.1%   0.2% 22.8KiB      serde_saphyr saphyr_parser_bw::scanner::Scanner<T>::fetch_more_tokens
 0.1%   0.2% 22.7KiB              prek <prek::languages::ruby::ruby::Ruby as prek::languages::LanguageImpl>::install::{{closure}}
 0.1%   0.2% 22.7KiB              prek prek::hooks::meta_hooks::MetaHooks::run::{{closure}}
 0.1%   0.2% 22.4KiB              prek prek::hooks::meta_hooks::MetaHooks::run::{{closure}}
 0.1%   0.2% 21.1KiB      clap_builder clap_builder::parser::parser::Parser::get_matches_with
 0.1%   0.2% 20.0KiB               std core::ptr::drop_in_place<prek::languages::<impl prek::config::Language>::install::{{closure}}>
 0.1%   0.2% 19.5KiB              prek prek::archive::unzip::{{closure}}
 0.1%   0.2% 19.4KiB   cargo_metadata? <cargo_metadata::_::<impl serde_core::de::Deserialize for cargo_metadata::Package>::deserialize::__Visitor as serde_core::de::Visitor>::visit_map
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 0.1%   0.2% 18.6KiB     serde_saphyr? <serde_saphyr::de::YamlDeserializer as serde_core::de::Deserializer>::deserialize_map
38.3%  91.8%  9.1MiB                   And 21088 smaller methods. Use -n N to show more.
41.8% 100.0% 10.0MiB                   .text section size, the file size is 23.9MiB

Copilot

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 4 out of 5 changed files in this pull request and generated 1 comment.

Copilot

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 4 out of 5 changed files in this pull request and generated 2 comments.

Copilot

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 5 out of 6 changed files in this pull request and generated 1 comment.

Copilot

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 5 out of 6 changed files in this pull request and generated 1 comment.

When `core.hooksPath` is set, install hooks to that directory instead of bailing. This makes `prek install` idempotent and ensures hooks end up where git will actually look for them. Relative `core.hooksPath` values are resolved against the git common dir, matching git's behavior. If the configured path is not writable, bail with a clear message using `faccess` for proper cross-platform writability checks. Closes j178#23 Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>

Copilot

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 5 out of 6 changed files in this pull request and generated no new comments.

Copilot

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 5 out of 6 changed files in this pull request and generated no new comments.

domenkozar · 2026-02-26T17:34:11Z

@j178 curious what you think about this solution :)

j178 · 2026-02-26T19:02:58Z

Thanks! I haven’t had much time for open source lately, but I’ll get back to you soon.

janlarres · 2026-03-01T01:27:49Z

I don't think silently writing to a global hooks path is a good idea. This will obviously affect all repositories which may not be desired, especially since prek will return an error if a repository doesn't have a config file. It may also overwrite a pre-existing global hook.

For example, in my case I have a hook script that you symlink to the hook names like pre-commit and which then runs all files in the respective *.d directory like pre-commit.d, in both the global hooks dir and the local one. This means that prek works fine for my setup as long as I unset core.hooksPath, run prek install, and set the path again, but this change would silently break all of my other pre-commit hooks by overwriting the symlink.

Personally my ideal solution would be if I could set a global config option to run prek install despite core.hooksPath being set because my setup is designed to deal with that, but this may not work for everyone.

domenkozar · 2026-03-01T12:53:11Z

I don't think silently writing to a global hooks path is a good idea. This will obviously affect all repositories which may not be desired, especially since prek will return an error if a repository doesn't have a config file. It may also overwrite a pre-existing global hook.

For example, in my case I have a hook script that you symlink to the hook names like pre-commit and which then runs all files in the respective *.d directory like pre-commit.d, in both the global hooks dir and the local one. This means that prek works fine for my setup as long as I unset core.hooksPath, run prek install, and set the path again, but this change would silently break all of my other pre-commit hooks by overwriting the symlink.

Personally my ideal solution would be if I could set a global config option to run prek install despite core.hooksPath being set because my setup is designed to deal with that, but this may not work for everyone.

I understand why your workflow works the way it does, but it feels backwards that git providers a way to tell where to install git hooks and then prek just bails out when that option is set.

I'd suggest that by default prek supports the option, optionally warns about where it's installing the hook and allows a knob to disable respecting the option for such cases. Would that work for you?

domenkozar · 2026-03-01T13:06:02Z

The issue I'm having is that https://github.com/cachix/git-hooks.nix sets core.hooksPath to .git/hooks so running prek install bails out where pre-commit respects that.

j178 · 2026-03-01T13:16:08Z

prek install sets core.hooksPath to .git/hooks

No, I don’t think prek changes any Git configuration. What makes you think that?

domenkozar · 2026-03-01T13:16:34Z

prek install sets core.hooksPath to .git/hooks

No, I don’t think prek changes any Git configuration. What makes you think that?

My mistake, I've changed the description of what happens :)

j178 · 2026-03-01T13:23:35Z

where pre-commit respects that

This doesn’t seem right either. Since prek uses the same logic as pre-commit, it should bail out too. Could you take a look at that?

❯ git init
❯ git config core.hooksPath hooks
❯ pre-commit install
[ERROR] Cowardly refusing to install hooks with `core.hooksPath` set.
hint: `git config --unset-all core.hooksPath`

git-hooks installation sets core.hooksPath to .git/hooks which doesn't work with prek. Unset it before installing hooks. j178/prek#1692 Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>

j178 · 2026-03-01T13:41:08Z

@domenkozar Could you take a look at #1723? It adds a --git-dir flag to prek install so you can force the hook installation target directory.

codecov · 2026-03-01T14:11:31Z

Codecov Report

❌ Patch coverage is 88.88889% with 3 lines in your changes missing coverage. Please review.
✅ Project coverage is 90.34%. Comparing base (85eff56) to head (44175af).
⚠️ Report is 22 commits behind head on master.

Files with missing lines	Patch %	Lines
crates/prek/src/cli/install.rs	90.00%	2 Missing ⚠️
crates/prek/src/git.rs	85.71%	1 Missing ⚠️

Additional details and impacted files

@@            Coverage Diff             @@
##           master    #1692      +/-   ##
==========================================
- Coverage   91.57%   90.34%   -1.23%     
==========================================
  Files          96       96              
  Lines       18842    18860      +18     
==========================================
- Hits        17255    17040     -215     
- Misses       1587     1820     +233

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Copilot AI review requested due to automatic review settings February 25, 2026 11:20

domenkozar requested a review from j178 as a code owner February 25, 2026 11:20

Copilot started reviewing on behalf of domenkozar February 25, 2026 11:21 View session