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Ryan Lanciaux
Ryan Lanciaux

Posted on

How should you ignore files for just you in git?

No, this isn't a post about .gitignore

The .gitignore file is a great way to exclude files from a repository for all users. This post is not about that.

I often want to ignore files that a tool / editor I use generates in a project. Others who are working in the project may not be using these same tools so adding to a .gitignore file may not be the best solution.

Exclude file

There is the concept of a local exclude file in git. It works just like .gitignore but the file is not checked in.

It's available at .git/info/exclude from a project directory.

Keep in mind

Files that should always be ignored should be specified in .gitignore. Files that you want to exclude locally could go in .git/info/exclude ๐Ÿ‘

(crossposted from ryanlanciaux.com)

Top comments (9)

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shreyasminocha profile image
Shreyas Minocha

Oh, that's new. I thought this would be about global gitignore. Thanks!

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dotproto profile image
Simeon Vincent • Edited

If you commonly create files that you don't want to commit to any of your projects, you can also create a global ignore file.

$ git config --global core.excludesfile ~/.gitignore_global

For example, say you're on a Mac and you want to make sure you never commit the .DS_Store files generated by your OS, you could run the below command to add an ignore rule to your global list.

$ echo ".DS_Store" >> ~/.gitignore_global
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moigagoo profile image
Constantine Molchanov • Edited

Knew about this trick but it never worked for me. Added a file to .git/info/exclude but it still gets tracked.

Is there anything else that should be done?

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Ryan Lanciaux

Interesting- itโ€™s always worked for me when I do this. Are these files that are previously tracked?

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moigagoo profile image
Constantine Molchanov

Yeah, that's why I'm trying to untrack them :-)

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moigagoo profile image
Constantine Molchanov
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ryanlanciaux profile image
Ryan Lanciaux

Oh good! If or doesnโ€™t end up working for you, please let me know and I can try to remember what I did in the past ๐Ÿ˜ƒ

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Hassam Ali

Man i wanted this so badly โ™ฅ๏ธโ™ฅ๏ธโ™ฅ๏ธโ™ฅ๏ธ

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Francisco Quintero ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ด

๐Ÿ˜ฎ๐Ÿค”๐Ÿค”