4 ms·

.gitignore Everything by Default

20 points by der_gopher 1y ago

Cloudef 1y ago
You can also gitignore everything and add files with the -f flag
- btschaegg 1y ago
  This. I just learned this recently. Intuitively, I had assumed that I could .gitignore a file and have it not show up in `git status`, even after staging it with `git add -f` and committing it this way. Turns out: That's not how it works. Instead, the .gitignore entries simply don't count for any already tracked files. (Yes, I know about `git update-index --assume-unchanged` but that has its own set of drawbacks…)
Noumenon72 1y ago
This is a smart pattern with .dockerignore where it keeps a lot of huge things from getting copied into the context... but it's also so confusing every time your container doesn't have the new file you created. I think you're going to have to allow `app/*` which means you will be checking in some .DS_STORE files anyway.
flysand7 1y ago
There's something similar I've done programming on linux. I've been working on some things in Odin programming language for a while and there are a ton of changes I've made where the commit contained an executable, because when Odin compiler makes the executable it names it after the main package's directory, without suffix. Once I complained about this to the community someone suggested a clever gitignore hack: * !*/ !*.* This by default ignores all files, except those that have a suffix and directories. I think this is a useful lesson - if you flip which files you ignore you can change the failure mode from "I accidentally committed a huge file into a repo" to "why isn't it working?". The latter can be pretty much be answered by good CI testing (maybe not always though).
thomascountz 1y ago
Instead of ignoring everything, this is how I manage my $HOME directory of dotfiles via a bare git repo. $ alias config='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.cfg/ --work-tree=$HOME' $ echo ".cfg" >> ~/.gitignore $ git clone --bare <git-repo-url> $HOME/.cfg $ config config --local status.showUntrackedFiles no Nothing is shown as untracked by default. When I add new config files to track, I have to add them to stage them explicitly. The only sticking point is when I forget to use `git add -u .` when committing changes to files which are already being tracked. I don't remember why I went with this over the global * ignore.
austinjp 1y ago
I discovered this[0] "allowlist" approach for Go a while ago: # Ignore everything \* # But not these files... !/.gitignore !*.go !go.sum !go.mod !README.md !LICENSE # ...even if they are in subdirectories !*/ [0] https://github.com/github/gitignore/blob/main/community/Golang/Go.AllowList.gitignore https://github.com/github/gitignore/blob/main/community/Gola...
gravel7623 1y ago
I kinda like it, but if you come to think of it, that's just a misuse of `git add -A`. Nothing goes into a git repository unless you specifically add it, so why not just be more careful when adding files?

20 points by der_gopher 1y ago

Cloudef 1y ago

You can also gitignore everything and add files with the -f flag

btschaegg 1y ago
This. I just learned this recently. Intuitively, I had assumed that I could .gitignore a file and have it not show up in `git status`, even after staging it with `git add -f` and committing it this way. Turns out: That's not how it works. Instead, the .gitignore entries simply don't count for any already tracked files. (Yes, I know about `git update-index --assume-unchanged` but that has its own set of drawbacks…)

Noumenon72 1y ago

This is a smart pattern with .dockerignore where it keeps a lot of huge things from getting copied into the context... but it's also so confusing every time your container doesn't have the new file you created. I think you're going to have to allow `app/*` which means you will be checking in some .DS_STORE files anyway.

flysand7 1y ago

There's something similar I've done programming on linux. I've been working on some things in Odin programming language for a while and there are a ton of changes I've made where the commit contained an executable, because when Odin compiler makes the executable it names it after the main package's directory, without suffix. Once I complained about this to the community someone suggested a clever gitignore hack: * !*/ !*.* This by default ignores all files, except those that have a suffix and directories. I think this is a useful lesson - if you flip which files you ignore you can change the failure mode from "I accidentally committed a huge file into a repo" to "why isn't it working?". The latter can be pretty much be answered by good CI testing (maybe not always though).

thomascountz 1y ago

Instead of ignoring everything, this is how I manage my $HOME directory of dotfiles via a bare git repo. $ alias config='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.cfg/ --work-tree=$HOME' $ echo ".cfg" >> ~/.gitignore $ git clone --bare <git-repo-url> $HOME/.cfg $ config config --local status.showUntrackedFiles no Nothing is shown as untracked by default. When I add new config files to track, I have to add them to stage them explicitly. The only sticking point is when I forget to use `git add -u .` when committing changes to files which are already being tracked. I don't remember why I went with this over the global * ignore.

austinjp 1y ago

I discovered this[0] "allowlist" approach for Go a while ago: # Ignore everything \* # But not these files... !/.gitignore !*.go !go.sum !go.mod !README.md !LICENSE # ...even if they are in subdirectories !*/ [0] https://github.com/github/gitignore/blob/main/community/Golang/Go.AllowList.gitignore https://github.com/github/gitignore/blob/main/community/Gola...

gravel7623 1y ago

I kinda like it, but if you come to think of it, that's just a misuse of `git add -A`. Nothing goes into a git repository unless you specifically add it, so why not just be more careful when adding files?