#22863 Desktop App Fetch/Pull from origin hangs indefinitely

The problem

When using the desktop app, any attempt by it to fetch or pull from origin will hang and spin indefinitely. Quitting the app while this is hanging will occasionally cause an issue which makes command line commands hang as well. I've found a temp solution for fixing the command line when this happens, but not the desktop app.

Release version

Github Desktop versions 3.4.19, 3.6.4, & 3.6.5

Operating system

macOS Tahoe 26.6.2

Steps to reproduce the behavior

I am authenticating with SSH. While I'm not sure if this is part of the cause, it definitely relates to some side effects that can occur.

Open the app.
Either click the "fetch" button or let it try and fetch on its own.
It hangs and spins indefinitely.

This happens regardless of repo, branch, etc.

See the "Additional Context" below for more details and information about side effects.

Log files

Github Desktop Logs (across several open/quit cycles & multiple versions/installation locations): Github Desktop Logs.log
Output from hung ssh -Tvvv [email protected] command in terminal: ssh -Tvvv [email protected] output (Hung).rtf
Output from successful ssh -Tvvv [email protected] command in terminal: ssh -Tvvv [email protected] output (Successful).rtf

Screenshots

https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/ad72e05f-5197-4fc4-b097-3c45fac6ae98

Additional context

More Detailed Versions and Computer/User information

macOS Tahoe 26.6.2
M5 Pro
Github Desktop 3.4.19, 3.6.4, & 3.6.5 (tried on each)
My user is not an admin of the computer
I'm authenticating via ssh.
Terminal is running zsh

More Explanation

Running ssh -T [email protected] in terminal before opening github desktop works fine, as does git fetch, git pull origin main, git switch <branch> and everything else I've tried.
When I open the app and it starts trying to fetch origin, it just hangs indefinitely.
Logs show nothing (see attached).
Have to quit the app to get it to stop, though it auto tries shortly after re-openning the app.
Sometimes (I've not found a clear pattern for when) after I have closed the app to stop the indefinite fetch, running commands that touch the server in terminal will also hang indefinitely as well.
- Once this happens, every non-local command I run in terminal will consistently hang indefinitely. This will persist even through a complete computer restart.
- ctrl + C will successfully stop the hung command. Terminal continues to work successfully, and I can see the process for the command stop in activity monitor after a couple seconds, so I don't think the command is continuing to run in the background like a zombie.
- Running ssh -Tvvv [email protected] once non-local terminal commands have started to hang will show that the last thing to happen before it hangs is ssh_get_authentication_socket_path: path '/var/run/com.apple.launchd.<uniq_value>/Listeners' (see full output attached).

To be clear, I have never gotten the desktop app to successfully fetch from origin on this computer, regardless of which of the app version I've used. To clone repos locally, I had to use the command line.

Fixing the Terminal Commands

I can get the commands in terminal to stop hanging by unsetting the SSH_AUTH_SOCK environment variable. But that has no effect on the desktop app. For the time being, I have added a command to my ~/zshrc file to unset this variable so I can quickly clear the issue if needed.

Things IT and I have Already Tried

Restarting the app, including confirming that all processes have quit through activity monitor
Restarting the computer
Reinstalling (including clearing the ~/Library/Application Support/Github Desktop directory)
Different desktop app versions (3.4.19, 3.6.4, & 3.6.5)
Installing in the global Applications directory (/Applications) and in an Applications directory local to my user (~/Applications)
Installing as admin and installing as my user (to avoid potential permission/ownership issues)
I have verified that we don't have case sensitive duplicates of branch names using the methods from this issue report