Re: which files are "known to git"?

>   i did a quick search for that phrase in the current code base and
> came up with:
>
> builtin/difftool.c:		/* The symlink is unknown to Git so read from the filesystem */
> dir.c:		error("pathspec '%s' did not match any file(s) known to git.",
> Documentation/git-rm.txt:removes only the paths that are known to Git.  Giving the name of
> Documentation/git-commit.txt:   be known to Git);
> Documentation/user-manual.txt:error: pathspec '261dfac35cb99d380eb966e102c1197139f7fa24' did not match any file(s) known to git.
> Documentation/gitattributes.txt:	Notice all types of potential whitespace errors known to Git.
> Documentation/git-clean.txt:Normally, only files unknown to Git are removed, but if the `-x`
> Documentation/RelNotes/1.8.2.1.txt: * The code to keep track of what directory names are known to Git on
> Documentation/RelNotes/1.8.1.6.txt: * The code to keep track of what directory names are known to Git on
> Documentation/RelNotes/2.9.0.txt:   known to Git.  They have been taught to do the normalization.
> Documentation/RelNotes/2.8.4.txt:   known to Git.  They have been taught to do the normalization.
> Documentation/RelNotes/1.8.3.txt: * The code to keep track of what directory names are known to Git on
> t/t3005-ls-files-relative.sh:			echo "error: pathspec $sq$f$sq did not match any file(s) known to git."
> t/t3005-ls-files-relative.sh:			echo "error: pathspec $sq$f$sq did not match any file(s) known to git."
>
> so it's not like there's a *ton* of that, but still enough to want to
> get it right. should there be a precise definition for the phrase
> "known to git", or should that phrase simply be banned/replaced?