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I have a lot of projects in my .Net solution. I would like to exclude all "bin/Debug" and "bin/Release" folders (and their contents), but still include the "bin" folder itself and any dll's contained therein.

.gitignore with "bin/" ignores "Debug" and "Release" folders, but also any dll's contained in the "bin" folder.

bin/Debug or bin/Release in the .gitignore file does not exclude the directories unless I fully qualify the ignore pattern as Solution/Project/bin/Debug - which I don't want to do as I will need to include this full pattern for each project in my solution, as well as add it for any new projects added.

Any suggestions?

Andrzej Sydor
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Marcel
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    Why add the DLL's? If you're referencing third party DLLs, it may make sense to add a common folder that all your projects then reference. – Paddy Mar 30 '10 at 13:39
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    Paddy's right - if those are third-party DLLs, they should probably be organized away from your code. To me, though, it sounds like you're checking in your own build products, which is not generally the way you want to go. You use git to track the *information*, which is fully contained in the code and build configuration. The products are, well, products. Tracking them is asking for trouble - for example, what if you change the code but forget to build and check in new products? – Cascabel Mar 30 '10 at 15:02
  • I had a problem in excluding subfolders. Tried everything, including the exact samples written here, but with no success. Finally i added a additional blank line between folder patterns, and it's working. Maybe a encoding problem. I have windows and encoded this in UTF8. – RoadBump Oct 10 '12 at 03:29

13 Answers13

880

Have you tried wildcards?

Solution/*/bin/Debug
Solution/*/bin/Release

With version 1.8.2 of git, you can also use the ** wildcard to match any level of subdirectories:

**/bin/Debug/
**/bin/Release/
Josh Lee
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    It works, except if there is a sub-folder with another project in e.g. Solution/Module/Project so for now I've added /*/*/bin/Debug and /*/*/*/bin/Debug (for sub folders). Looks like you have to add a wildcard sub folder for each level in your directory structure. – Marcel Mar 30 '10 at 14:08
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    @Marcel: Well, git certainly isn't going to ignore any files you don't tell it to - it ignores whatever matches the wildcards, no more, no less. – Cascabel Mar 30 '10 at 14:59
  • I think that double star will cross directory boundaries, ie: /**/bin/Debug – Trent Dec 29 '11 at 23:07
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    @Taras: Unfortunately, it does not. – Tuukka Mustonen Jan 12 '12 at 13:33
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    There was a bug on Visual Studio related to `**` . Should be fixed by now. [link](http://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedbackdetail/view/976537/consecutive-asterisks-in-gitignore-handled-incorrectly-by-microsoft-git-provider) – Bogac Mar 10 '15 at 15:41
  • If only one file exists in "bin", and no subfolders, then it not works. (want to delete ignored dirs with : git clean -Xfdn) – Daniel Hári Jun 28 '16 at 16:04
  • How is this different to just use "bin/Debug/"? – ManuelSchneid3r Jan 24 '17 at 11:17
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    I'm noticing that the `**/` prefix is required for directory paths with multiple levels; e.g., `**/wwwroot/dist/`, but specifying `dist/` alone works without the `**/` prefix when attempting to match the path spec somewhere beneath the root. – bvj Feb 28 '18 at 23:54
157

You can use .gitignore in the top level to ignore all directories in the project with the same name. For example:

Debug/
Release/

This should update immediately so it's visible when you do git status. Ensure that these directories are not already added to git, as that will override the ignores.

Andreas
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  • The same could be done by adding the patterns to the OPs `$GIT_DIR/.git/info/exclude` file. – Tim Henigan Mar 30 '10 at 20:14
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    The difference is that the .gitignore file will follow the code, so it applies everywhere. Whereas the exclude file is local to only your repository, meaning it only applies for that specific repository. Unless other committers have a reason to want to commit these directories, I would recommend using .gitignore. – Andreas Mar 31 '10 at 05:27
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    Another problem with this is if you have a project in your solution called Debug, which will then also be ignored. I think the solution is a combination of all the answers and comments - restructure the solution to keep common or referenced dll's in a different folder, then ignoring "bin/" and/or use wildcards. – Marcel Apr 01 '10 at 10:08
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    +1 For comment on ensuring directories not already added to git. If already added to git, do: `git rm -rf DirectoryName/` – levibostian Dec 15 '13 at 07:59
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    Doesn't work for me. directories created by build continue to pop up as unstaged. Driving me crazy. git rm -rf reports foo/ reports that foo is not present. – Lewis Levin Mar 27 '21 at 00:40
  • Strange, I can't recreate that behavior (on Mac OS X 11.2 using git v2.31.1). Here's my session: https://gist.github.com/andreaja/c2a07ecc6cc5bb332a198fd2cc78c8e8 – Andreas Apr 03 '21 at 18:44
121

All the above answers are valid, but something that I don't think is mentioned is that once you add a file from that directory into the repo, you can't ignore that directory/subdirectory that contains that file (git will ignore that directive).

To ignore already added files run

$ git rm -r --cached .

Otherwise you'll have to remove all files from the repo's target directory first - and then you can ignore that folder.

Phil
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ajacian81
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    git rm --cached if you want them untracked/irrelevant to history but want to keep the files intact locally. – Erik Reppen May 30 '15 at 21:04
  • Simply: git reset Solution , than add to .gitignore Solution/*/bin/Debug, Solution/*/bin/Release, and than git add Solutions – NotTooTechy Jul 22 '20 at 21:37
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    It should be ```git rm -r --cached .``` – OceanFire Apr 14 '21 at 10:16
  • How can undo this command? – user3748973 May 29 '22 at 12:30
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    i think `git reset` will undo this command – Arun Girivasan Sep 19 '22 at 05:55
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    There should be a **WARNING** in front of this answer, or at least a bold disclaimer to know in which folder to run this command. `git reset` can get you out of the mess you might have created using `git rm -r --cached .`, but you will have trouble recuperating the status of git (like git adds and git rm etc...) you had before. And I myself have to remember to think before copy-pasting a command. I always start getting complacent after a year or two... :P – Lionel Trebuchon Dec 09 '22 at 09:30
80

The question isn't asking about ignoring all subdirectories, but I couldn't find the answer anywhere, so I'll post it: */*.

mgold
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    Any chance you could clarify? I've tried all sorts of variations on this and can't get `git add` to ignore a directory and all files in all subdirectories of that directory. I have tried `dirname/`, `dirname/*`, `dirname/**`, `dirname/*/*`, even in desperation `dirname/*/*/*`, `dirname/*/*/*/*`, `dirname/*/*/*/*/*`. – Chris Nov 20 '14 at 17:13
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    `*/*` ignores all subdirectories but not files in the current directory. To ignore a specific subdirectory is normal gitignore usage. `dirname`, `dirname/`, and `dirname/*` all work for me. Has anything in that directory already been committed? – mgold Nov 21 '14 at 03:18
  • It is a brand new repo - I delete the whole `.git` directory between attempts, then `git init` then `git add --all .` (have also tried without `--all`), using 1.9.4.msysgit.1. Every non-empty subdirectory under my named directory is added to the index (checked in TortoiseGit and `git status`). There are no relevant lines in `.gitignore` starting `!` but must be some conflict. Solved for now by removing the folders during `add`. Guess this is something that'll require a bit more digging to provide the necessary info to diagnose. Thanks for reassuring me that I'm not misunderstanding the syntax. – Chris Nov 21 '14 at 14:51
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    What if I need to ignore a folder inside a folder, but not the first one? As in **forum/ignorethisfolder/** ...but he is not to ignore the folder called forum – Jean Carlos Racoski Dec 28 '16 at 11:25
  • This doesn't work for me in ignoring a directory whose name starts with a dot. "*/.*" and ".*/*" don't work either. – Tony Apr 28 '18 at 02:53
52

To exclude content and subdirectories:

**/bin/*

To just exclude all subdirectories but take the content, add "/":

**/bin/*/
A. Morel
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39

Besides putting the correct entries in your .gitignore file, if you're trying to ignore something already added to the repo, you have to do git rm -r /path/to/dir and commit that before you add the dir to your .gitignore file. Otherwise the only thing git will ignore is your ignore directive.

MidnightJava
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The only way I got this to work on my machine was to do it this way:

# Ignore all directories, and all sub-directories, and it's contents:
*/*

#Now ignore all files in the current directory 
#(This fails to ignore files without a ".", for example 
#'file.txt' works, but 
#'file' doesn't):
/*.*

#Only Include these specific directories and subdirectories:
!wordpress/
!wordpress/*/
!wordpress/*/wp-content/
!wordpress/*/wp-content/themes/

Notice how you have to explicitly allow content for each level you want to include. So if I have subdirectories 5 deep under themes, I still need to spell that out.

This is from @Yarin's comment here: https://stackoverflow.com/a/5250314/1696153

These were useful topics:

I also tried 

*
*/*
**/**

and **/wp-content/themes/**

or /wp-content/themes/**/*

None of that worked for me, either. Lots of trail and error!

ruttoa
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Katie
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  • This negation pattern is the most correct method to accomplish the task put forward in the question. – Supamic Jul 11 '22 at 23:02
17

The simplest form to ignore all subfolders of the root of your repo, but include the files at the root of this folder is to add this to your .gitignore file:

*/

If you want ignore all subfolders of another subfolder (still including the files there):

subfolder/*/

If you have already commited items that need to be ignored, you will need to remove them from the repo before they are ignored.

To remove all subfolders of the root of your repo:

git rm -r --cached */*

To remove all subfolders of another subfolder:

git rm -r --cached subfolder/*/*
Tolga
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    Thanks I used .vscode/*/ I would add to your solution "ignore subfolders **but include the files at the root of this folder.**" – Meryan Apr 17 '21 at 20:14
  • Thank you, was wondering why adding the files to .gitignore was not working; they were already committed into the repo – Specimen May 23 '21 at 14:08
15

To ignore all subdirectories you can simply use:

**/

This works as of version 1.8.2 of git.

frederickjh
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11

The generic way to ignore all subfolders, while continuing to track the files that are in the /bin directory would be to add the following line to your project's .gitignore file:

bin/*/*

If you want to ignore only particular named subfolders, you can do:

bin/Debug/*
bin/Release/*

nb. if the bin directory is not in the root of your project (alongside the .gitignore file), then instead of eg. bin/*/* you might need path/to/bin/*/*

Nick F
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6

Seems this page still shows up on the top of Google search after so many years...

Modern versions of Git support nesting .gitignore files within a single repo. Just place a .gitignore file in the subdirectory that you want ignored. Use a single asterisk to match everything in that directory:

echo "*" > /path/to/bin/Debug/.gitignore
echo "*" > /path/to/bin/Release/.gitignore

If you've made previous commits, remember to remove previously tracked files:

git rm -rf /path/to/bin/Debug
git rm -rf /path/to/bin/Release

You can confirm it by doing git status to show you all the files removed from tracking.

slackair
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0

For ignoring subfolders but not main folder I could only get this to work in Visual Studio Code by placing a dummy readme.txt in the main folder. Only then /*/ checked in the main folder (and no subfolders).

edelwater
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https://stackoverflow.com/a/50910637/10611870 This answer works for me on Win10 GitBash.

If you want to ignore subfolders only, folder/*/ is correct.

Jun
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