How to stop tracking and ignore changes to a file in Git

Question

I have cloned a project that includes some  csproj files  I don t need like my local csproj files being tracked by Git  or being brought up when creating a patch   but clearly they are needed in the project   I have added   csproj to my LOCAL  gitignore  but the files are already in the repo   When I type git status  it shows my changes to csproj which I am not interested in keeping track of or submitting for patches   How do I remove the  tracking of  these files from my personal repo  but keep them in the source so I can use them  so that I don t see the changes when I do a status  or create a patch    Is there a correct canonical way to handle this situation

User · Answer

This is a two step process    Remove tracking of file folder - but keep them on disk - using   git rm --cached    Now they do not show up as  changed  but still show as         untracked files in  git status -u    Add them to  gitignore

User · Answer

To save some time the rules you add to your  gitignore can be used for removing multiple files folders i e   git rm --cached app      xml  or  git rm --cached -r app widgets yourfolder   e t c

User · Answer

I am assuming that you are asking how to remove ALL the files in a specific folder or the bin folder  Rather than selecting each files separately    You can use this command  git rm -r -f   lt floder-name gt    Make sure that you are in the parent directory of the of that directory   This command will  recursively  delete  all the files which are in the bin  or build  folders  By the word delete I mean that git will pretend that those files are  deleted  and those files will not be tracked  The git really marks those files to be in delete mode   Do make sure that you have your  gitignore ready for upcoming commits  Documentation   git rm

User · Answer

Just calling git rm --cached on each of the files you want to remove from revision control should be fine  As long as your local ignore patterns are correct you won t see these files included in the output of git status   Note that this solution removes the files from the repository  so all developers would need to maintain their own local  non-revision controlled  copies of the file  To prevent git from detecting changes in these files you should also use this command   git update-index --assume-unchanged  path    What you probably want to do   from below  Ryan Taylor answer         This is to tell git you want your own independent version of the file or folder  For instance  you don t want to overwrite  or delete    production staging config files          git update-index --skip-worktree  lt path-name gt    The full answer is here in this URL  http   source kohlerville com 2009 02 untrack-files-in-git

User · Answer

The problem may be caused by the order of operation  If you modified the  gitignore first  then git rm --cached xxx you may have to continue to encounter this problem   Correct solution    git rm --cached xxx modified the  gitignore   Order invariant   The  gitignore reload after modification

User · Answer

As pointed out in other answers  the selected answer is wrong   The answer to another question suggests that it may be skip-worktree that would be required   git update-index --skip-worktree  lt file gt

User · Answer

There are 3 options  you probably want  3  1  This will keep the local file for you  but will delete it for anyone else when they pull   git rm --cached  lt file-name gt  or git rm -r --cached  lt folder-name gt   2  This is for optimization  like a folder with a large number of files  e g  SDKs that probably won t ever change   It tells git to stop checking that huge folder every time for changes  locally  since it won t have any   The assume-unchanged index will be reset and file s  overwritten if there are upstream changes to the file folder  when you pull    git update-index --assume-unchanged  lt path-name gt    3  This is to tell git you want your own independent version of the file or folder   For instance  you don t want to overwrite  or delete  production staging config files   git update-index --skip-worktree  lt path-name gt    It s important to know that git update-index will not propagate with git  and each user will have to run it independently

User · Answer

Apply  gitignore to the present future  This method applies the standard  gitignore behavior  and does not require manually specifying the files that need to be ignored  Can t use --exclude-from  gitignore anymore    - Here s the updated method  General advice  start with a clean repo - everything committed  nothing pending in working directory or index  and make a backup    commit up-to-date  gitignore  if not already existing   this command must be run on each branch git add  gitignore git commit -m  quot Create  gitignore quot    apply standard git ignore behavior only to current index  not working directory  --cached   if this command returns nothing  ensure   git info exclude AND OR  gitignore exist  this command must be run on each branch git ls-files -z --ignored --exclude-standard   xargs -0 git rm --cached   optionally add anything to the index that was previously ignored but now shouldn t be  git add     commit again  optionally use the --amend flag to merge this commit with the previous one instead of creating 2 commits   git commit -m  quot re-applied modified  gitignore quot    other devs who pull after this commit is pushed will see the  newly- gitignored files DELETED  If you also need to purge the newly-ignored files from the branch s commit history or if you don t want the newly-ignored files to be deleted from future pulls  see this answer

User · Answer

To prevent monitoring a file by git  git update-index --assume-unchanged  file-path    And to revert it back use   git update-index --no-assume-unchanged  file-path    A repo to refer for similar use cases https   github com awslabs git-secrets

User · Answer

Lots of people advise you to use git update-index --assume-unchanged  Indeed  this may be a good solution  but only in the short run   What you probably want to do is this  git update-index --skip-worktree    The third option  which you probably don t want is  git rm --cached  It will keep your local file  but will be marked as removed from the remote repository    Difference between the first two options    assume-unchanged is to temporary allow you to hide modifications from a file  If you want to hide modifications done to a file  modify the file  then checkout another branch  you ll have to use no-assume-unchanged then probably stash modifications done  skip-worktree will follow you whatever the branch you checkout  with your modifications    Use case of assume-unchanged  It assumes this file should not be modified  and gives you a cleaner output when doing git status  But when checking out to another branch  you need to reset the flag and commit or stash changes before so  If you pull with this option activated  you ll need to solve conflicts and git won t auto merge  It actually only hides modifications  git status won t show you the flagged files    I like to use it when I only want to stop tracking changes for a while   commit a bunch of files  git commit -a  related to the same modification   Use case of skip-worktree  You have a setup class containing parameters  eg  including passwords  that your friends have to change accordingly to their setup    1  Create a first version of this class  fill in fields you can fill and leave others empty null  2  Commit and push it to the remote server  3  git update-index --skip-worktree MySetupClass java 4  Update your configuration class with your own parameters  5  Go back to work on another functionnality    The modifications you do will follow you whatever the branch  Warning  if your friends also want to modify this class  they have to have the same setup  otherwise their modifications would be pushed to the remote repository  When pulling  the remote version of the file should overwrite yours   PS  do one or the other  but not both as you ll have undesirable side-effects  If you want to try another flag  you should disable the latter first

User · Answer

An almost git command-free approach was given in this answer   To ignore certain files for every local repo    Create a file    gitignore global  e g  by touch    gitignore global in your terminal   Run git config --global core excludesfile    gitignore global for once  Write the file dir paths you want to ignore into    gitignore global  e g  modules   H  which will be assumed to be in your working directory  i e   WORK DIR modules   H    To ignore certain files for a single local repo    Do the above third step for file  git info exclude within the repo  that is write the file dir paths you want to ignore into  git info exclude  e g  modules   C  which will be assumed to be in your working directory  i e   WORK DIR modules   C

User · Answer

I am assuming that you are trying to remove a single file from git tacking  for that I would recommend below command   git update-index --assume-unchanged  Ex - git update-index --assume-unchanged  gitignore  idea compiler xml

User · Answer

To tell Git not to track changes to your local file folder  meaning git status won t detect changes to it   do   git update-index --skip-worktree path to file   And to tell Git to track changes to your local version once again  so you can commit the changes   do   git update-index --no-skip-worktree path to file

User · Answer

Forgot your  gitignore   If you have the entire project locally but forgot to add you git ignore and are now tracking some unnecessary files use this command to remove everything  git rm --cached -r     make sure you are at the root of the project   Then you can do the usual   Add  git add     Commit  git commit -m  removed all and added with git ignore    Push  git push origin master   Conclusion  Hope this helps out people who have to make changes to their  gitignore or forgot it all together     It removes the entire cache Looks at your  gitignore Adds the files you want to track Pushes to your repo

User · Answer

after search a long time   find a way do this   alias a git command in  gitconfig like in android studio project before checkout branch revert config file and then skip it  after checkout branch use sed change config file to my local config   checkoutandmodifylocalproperties    git update-index --no-skip-worktree local properties  amp  amp  git checkout local properties  amp  amp  git checkout  1  amp  amp  git update-index --skip-worktree local properties  amp  amp  sed -i     s   sdk dir   sdk dir    Users   run   Library   Android   sdk g  local properties  amp  amp

User · Answer

The accepted answer still did not work for me  I used      git rm -r --cached        git add        git commit -m  fixing  gitignore    Found the answer from here

User · Answer

If you do git update-index --assume-unchanged file csproj  git won t check file csproj for changes automatically  that will stop them coming up in git status whenever you change them  So you can mark all your  csproj files this way- although you ll have to manually mark any new ones that the upstream repo sends you   If you have them in your  gitignore or  git info exclude  then ones you create will be ignored   I m not entirely sure what  csproj files are    if they re something along the lines of IDE configurations  similar to Eclipse s  eclipse and  classpath files  then I d suggest they should simply never be source-controlled at all  On the other hand  if they re part of the build system  like Makefiles  then clearly they should--- and a way to pick up optional local changes  e g  from a local csproj a la config mk  would be useful  divide the build up into global parts and local overrides

User · Answer

one line answer git update-index --assume-unchanged  path   Use this whenever you have a file that is in central repo and also local repo you need to make changes in that file but must not be staged committed to the central repo  This file should not be added in  gitignore  because new changes in the file if introduced by system administrators  senior developers needs to be distributed among all local repos   Best Example  config file for DB connections  In a central repo  you will have all the username password  host port with values of a production DB server  But in local dev  you should use only a local or any other development DB server that your team has setup   In this case you wanna make changes in config file but should not be committed to central repo   Best

User · Answer

To ignore any changes to all the files  of a certain type  in a directory  I had to combine some of these approaches  otherwise the files were created if they didn t previously exist   In the below   excludedir  is the name of the directory that I wish to not watch changes to   First  remove any existing new files from your change tracking cache  without removing from your file system    git status   grep  new file     cut  --complement -d     -f1-4   grep   excludedir    xargs git rm --cache   You can do the same with modified    renamed  is a bit more complicated  as you ll have to look at the post - gt  bit for the new filename  and do the pre - gt  bit as described for deleted  below   deleted  files prove a bit more complicated  as you can t seem to update-index for a file that doesn t exist on the local system  echo  deletedfiles  gt  gt   gitignore git status   grep  deleted     cut  --complement -d     -f1-4   grep   excludedir   gt   deletedfiles cat  deletedfiles   xargs -d   n  touch cat  deletedfiles   xargs -d   n  git add -f cat  deletedfiles   xargs -d   n  git update-index --assume-unchanged cat  deletedfiles   xargs -d   n  rm   The last command in the list above will remove the files again from your file system  so feel free to omit that   Then  block change tracking from that directory  git ls-files excludedir    xargs git update-index --skip-worktree git update index --skip-worktree excludedir

User · Answer

git rm --fileName git ls-files to make sure that the file is removed or untracked git commit -m  quot UntrackChanges quot  git push

[git] How to stop tracking and ignore changes to a file in Git?

Examples related to git