How to fix "gitignore not working" issue

How to fix gitignore not working issue.md

FYI: Created blog post with more details

How to fix ".gitignore not working" issue?

Sometimes git does not exclude files/folders added .gitignore especially if you had commited them before. Here is how to fix it. I am ignoring node_modules from Angular project as an example

1. Update .gitignore with the folder/file name you want to ignore. You can use anyone of the formats mentioned below (prefer format1)

### Format1  ###
node_modules/
node/

### Format2  ###
**/frontend/node_modules/**
**/frontend/node/**

2. Commit all the changes to git. Exclude the folder/files you don't want commit, in my case node_modules
3. Execute the following command to clear the cache

git rm -r --cached .

4. Execute git status command and it should output node_modules and sub directories marked for deletion
5. Now execute

git add .
git commit -m "fixed untracked files" 

6. That's it. Comment if you any questions.

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Update: Windows users make sure your .gitignore uses UTF-8 rather than UTF-16. See comment for details

Man, I really need to look stuff like this up more often xD

2023 and still usefull information. Thanks

Thank You Bro

I can't thank you enough. This has been driving me batshit crazy for months.

Ur the man!

Thank you.

This solved my issue. Thanks! 👍

This works! Awesome!

Thanks, Sir!

Thanks
This works.

thanks man