How to stop tracking and ignore changes to a file in Git?

Question

I have cloned a project that includes some .csproj files. I don\'t need/like my local csproj files being tracked by Git (or being brought up when c

Answer 1

Apply .gitignore to the present/future

This method applies the standard .gitignore behavior, and does not require manually specifying the files that need to be ignored.

Can't use --exclude-from=.gitignore anymore :/ - Here's the updated method:

General advice: start with a clean repo - everything committed, nothing pending in working directory or index, and make a backup!

#commit up-to-date .gitignore (if not already existing)
#this command must be run on each branch
git add .gitignore
git commit -m "Create .gitignore"

#apply standard git ignore behavior only to current index, not working directory (--cached)
#if this command returns nothing, ensure /.git/info/exclude AND/OR .gitignore exist
#this command must be run on each branch
git ls-files -z --ignored --exclude-standard | xargs -0 git rm --cached

#optionally add anything to the index that was previously ignored but now shouldn't be:
git add *

#commit again
#optionally use the --amend flag to merge this commit with the previous one instead of creating 2 commits.

git commit -m "re-applied modified .gitignore"

#other devs who pull after this commit is pushed will see the  newly-.gitignored files DELETED

If you also need to purge the newly-ignored files from the branch's commit history or if you don't want the newly-ignored files to be deleted from future pulls, see this answer.