.gitignore fails to ignore all files except folders

Question

Basically, I have the following folder structure:

repo 
     README.md
     testing_folder
           readingme.md
     resources_folder

And in my .gitignore file, I want to ignore all files except folders in current directory and this is what I have :

*
!.gitignore
!*/

When I do git status, this is what I get:

On branch master
Your branch is ahead of 'origin/master' by 1 commit.
  (use "git push" to publish your local commits)
Changes to be committed:
  (use "git reset HEAD <file>..." to unstage)

    modified:   .gitignore

Changes not staged for commit:
  (use "git add <file>..." to update what will be committed)
  (use "git checkout -- <file>..." to discard changes in working directory)

    modified:   .gitignore
    modified:   README.md

Problem is: it doesn't show that the testing_folder and resources_folder are untracked. And when I try to do git add testing/readingme.md, I got the following error message:

The following paths are ignored by one of your .gitignore files:
testing/readingme.md
Use -f if you really want to add them.
fatal: no files added

I am starting to get really confused now because I have read so many other related posts. They seem to work but mine just doesn't work.

I tried including and excluding the !*/ statement in .gitignore file but still the folders are not shown as untracked.

What about files in child directories? Do you want them ignored too, or only files in the top level directory? — Eric Palace, Dec 03 '14 at 20:11

score 2 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:27

2

I've recreated the directory structure you showed in the post, and when my .gitignore contains:

/*
!*/                                                                         
!.gitignore

I did notice that when the first line was * instead of /* I had the same problem as you. Adding the /, I would guess, gives git enough context to do what you want. With the /* my git status returns:

On branch master
Changes to be committed:
  (use "git reset HEAD <file>..." to unstage)

    modified:   .gitignore

Untracked files:
  (use "git add <file>..." to include in what will be committed)

    testing_folder/

This will, essentially, only track files which aren't in the parent directory. The reason why resources_folder isn't showing up is because git doesn't track empty directories. There are some ways to trick git into tracking empty folders, but it's not default behavior.

edited May 23 '17 at 12:27

Community

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1

answered Dec 03 '14 at 20:51

Eric Palace

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14

I am getting a little bit confused now. So what is the major difference between `/*` and `*` ? And when to use which ? – mynameisJEFF Dec 03 '14 at 23:04
To be completely honest, I'm not really sure why `/*` works when `*` doesn't. I think generally if you use `*`, git will be VERY liberal in ignoring things, as you're telling it to just go ahead and ignore everything. Using `/*`, while seeming pretty similar, is explicitly not ignoring the root and that might let you be a bit more strict with what gets ignored and what is included. – Eric Palace Dec 04 '14 at 14:37

.gitignore fails to ignore all files except folders

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