At 2010-09-22 20:54:19 -0400, tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us wrote:
>
> However, it seems that git isn't so willing to tell you about gitignore
> patterns that cover too much, i.e. match files that are already in the
> repository.
If .gitignore specifies a pattern that matches something that's already
in the repository, that specification is itself ignored, and the file is
treated like any other file.
> This seems pretty dangerous, especially for people who are willing to
> rely on "git commit -a" :-(
There is no danger. "git commit -a" will commit changes to files that
match .gitignore but are already in the repository. (I vaguely remember
that there were bugs in this regard in old versions of git, but it's not
a problem with any recent version AFAIK.)
-- ams