Re: gitignore design

From: Ferry Huberts <mailings@hupie.com>
Date: Jul 29, 2011, 14:01 UTC
Message-ID: <4E32BD2C.4090508@hupie.com>
In-Reply-To: <m3tya5qm86.fsf@localhost.localdomain>

On 07/29/2011 02:57 PM, Jakub Narebski wrote:

Show 8 quoted lines

> llucianf <llucianf@gmail.com> writes:
> 
>> im sure cvs doesnt require you to remove files from repo in order to ignore
>> them. i used cvs for years and its ingonre policy is simple and effective.
>> you just put the files/patterns into ignore file and things happen aka they
>> are ignored.
> 
> _Untracked_ files are ignored.  Tracked files are not, even with CVS.

yeah llucianf, you could have checked this yourself...

the way it works now is safer: if someone by accident puts a tracked file in an ignore file then the file is still not ignored. you actually _want_ to see the file changes since you are after all tracking the file.

git takes a safe route here.

having the file ignored while it is still in the repo can lead to very very strange situation.

suppose someone puts a complicated ignore pattern in an ignore file that has a mistake in it. then 'real' files might be ignored by the pattern by git will still see the changes.

but to come back to cvs: cvs appears to do the same as git does so your complaint is unfounded.

Show 32 quoted lines

> 
>   $ echo file2.txt >>.cvsignore
>   $ echo "3 line"  >>file2.txt
> 
> Now 'cvs status' shows file as 
> 
>   File: file2.txt         Status: Locally Modified
> 
> and 'cvs diff' shows changes.
> 
> CVS 1.11.19
> 
> [And damn, how hard it was to check this in CVS as compared to
>  checking similar things with Git].
> 
>> with this very intelligent git this simple thing is not so simple. of course
>> there are workarounds (like the template example you gave) but they are
>> clumsy.
> 
> They are correct and better solutions than ignoring changes.
> 
> Ignoring changes to tracked files is much more rare than having broad
> ignore file, and tracking some files that match ignore patterns (but
> note that you must use "git add --force" to add/track ignored file).
> 
>> im just trying to understand why git ignore mechanism cant just read the
>> .gitignore file and obey to those ignore rules without asking you to do
>> fancy voodoo operations such removing those files from repo.
> 
> Please read carefully: I mentioned 'ASSUME-UNCHANGED' mechanism in
> both of my posts, haven't I?
>

-- 
Ferry Huberts