R studio will not start while Git for Windows is installed

Question

I'm trying to use version to upload an R package to github. The problem is, once I've installed git version 2.10.0, Rstudio will not open. Oddly, R still works if I don't use R studio. I've re-installed R (now using 3.3.1) R studio, and Rtools. If I uninstall git, Rstudio works again. I've used the 'Run Diagnostics' tool in the bin folder of Rstudio (while git is installed) to try and figure out what is going on. I get the following mess in the command window:

>Attempting to launch R session...
>R_HOME=C:\PROGRA~1\R\R-33~1.1
>PATH=C:\Program Files\R\R-  
>3.3.1\bin\x64;C:\Perl64\site\bin;C:\Perl64\bin;C:\Pr
>ogramData\Oracle\Java\javapath;C:\Program Files\Broadcom\Broadcom 802.11     
>Network
>Adapter;C:\Program Files (x86)\Intel\iCLS Client\;C:\Program   
>Files\Intel\iCLS   
>Client\;C:\windows\system32;C:\windows;C:\windows\System32\Wbem;
>C:\windows\System
>32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;C:\Program Files\Intel\Intel(R) Management   
>Engine Components\DAL;C:\Program Files\Intel\Intel(R) Management Engine 
>Components\IPT;C:\
>Program Files (x86)\Intel\Intel(R) Management Engine  
>Components\DAL;C:\Program Files (x86)\Intel\Intel(R) Management Engine
>Components\IPT;C:\Program Files\Leno
>vo\Bluetooth Software\;C:\Program Files\Lenovo\Bluetooth  
>Software\syswow64;C:\Program Files\MATLAB\R2014a\runtime\win64;C:\Program 
>Files\MATLAB\R2014a\bin;C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows 
>Live\Shared;C:\Program Files\Git\cmd

>R session launched, attempting to connect on port 29645...

>Connected to R session, attempting to initialize...

Answer 1

We have seen issues of this form occur when RStudio is pointing to the 'wrong' Git executable; for example, if you tried to indicate to RStudio that git-bash.exe should be used rather than git.exe, bad things will happen. (The preview version of RStudio now tries to enforce that you choose a git executable called git.exe.)

The simplest way to resolve this is to clear out your RStudio local session state -- see https://support.rstudio.com/hc/en-us/articles/200534577-Resetting-RStudio-Desktop-s-State for more information.