gemini-cli - 💡(How to fix) Fix GEMINI.md discovery fails on Case-sensitive filesystems (macOS APFS)

What happened?

CLI Version: 0.41.2 OS: macOS (Darwin) 25.4.0 Filesystem: APFS (Case-sensitive)

Problem: The CLI fails to automatically discover and load instructions from GEMINI.md (uppercase) files in both the global home directory (~/.gemini/GEMINI.md) and the local project root. Commands like /memory show return "Memory is currently empty" despite the files being present.

Steps to Reproduce:

1. Use a macOS volume formatted as APFS (Case-sensitive).
2. Create ~/.gemini/GEMINI.md with some instructions.
3. Start gemini and run /memory show. (Result: Empty)
4. Rename the file to ~/.gemini/gemini.md (lowercase).
5. Run /memory reload then /memory show. (Result: Instructions loaded)

Expected Behavior: The CLI should prioritize GEMINI.md (all caps) as the standard filename for instructions, as documented, even on case-sensitive filesystems.

Technical Root Cause Analysis: The discovery logic likely uses a lowercase string (gemini.md) when calling fs.stat() or similar system calls. On case-sensitive volumes, this fails to match the standard GEMINI.md filename. It also affects "Just-In-Time" context loading.

What did you expect to happen?

I expected the CLI to automatically discover and load the GEMINI.md file (uppercase) on startup, as this is the documented standard filename. Since GEMINI.md is the industry-standard casing for instructional files (similar to README.md), the discovery logic should successfully stat and read the file regardless of whether the filesystem is case-sensitive or case-insensitive. Specifically, /memory show should have displayed the contents of the root GEMINI.md and ~/.gemini/GEMINI.md without requiring a rename to lowercase.

Client information

• CLI Version: 0.41.2
• Git Commit: b0c7a1722
• Operating System: darwin v25.4.0
• Sandbox Environment: no sandbox
• Model Version: auto-gemini-3
• Auth Type: oauth-personal
• Memory Usage: 320.7 MB
• Terminal Name: Unknown
• Terminal Background: #212734
• Kitty Keyboard Protocol: Unsupported

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