In score_trees(), we walk over two sorted trees to find which entries are missing or have different content between the two. So if we have two trees with these entries: one two --- --- a a b c c d we'd expect the loop to: - compare "a" to "a" - compare "b" to "c"; because these are sorted lists, we know that the second tree does not have "b" - compare "c" to "c" - compare "d" to end-of-list; we know that the first tree does not have "d" And prior to d8febde370 (match-trees: simplify score_trees() using tree_entry(), 2013-03-24) that worked. But after that commit, we mistakenly increment the tree pointers for every loop iteration, even when we've processed the entry for only one side. As a result, we end up doing this: - compare "a" to "a" - compare "b" to "c"; we know that we do not have "b", but we still increment both tree pointers; at this point we're out of sync and all further comparisons are wrong - compare "c" to "d" and mistakenly claim that the second tree does not have "c" - exit the loop, mistakenly not realizing that the first tree does not have "d" So contrary to the claim in d8febde370, we really do need to manually use update_tree_entry(), because advancing the tree pointer depends on the entry comparison. That means we must stop using tree_entry() to access each entry, since it auto-advances the pointer. Instead: - we'll use tree_desc.size directly to know if there's anything left to look at (which is what tree_entry() was doing under the hood) - rather than do an extra struct assignment to "e1" and "e2", we can just access the "entry" field of tree_desc directly That makes us a little more intimate with the tree_desc code, but that's not uncommon for its callers. The included test shows off the bug by adding a new entry "bar.t", which sorts early in the tree and de-syncs the comparison for "foo.t", which comes after. Reported-by: George Shammas <georgyo@gmail.com> Helped-by: René Scharfe <l.s.r@web.de> Signed-off-by: Jeff King <peff@peff.net> Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>