How to remove local (untracked) files from the current Git working tree

Question

How do you delete untracked local files from your current working tree?

Answer 1

git clean -f -d -x $(git rev-parse --show-cdup) applies clean to the root directory, no matter where you call it within a repository directory tree. I use it all the time as it does not force you to leave the folder where you working now and allows to clean & commit right from the place where you are.

Be sure that flags -f, -d, -x match your needs:

-d
       Remove untracked directories in addition to untracked files. If an
       untracked directory is managed by a different Git repository, it is
       not removed by default. Use -f option twice if you really want to
       remove such a directory.

-f, --force
       If the Git configuration variable clean.requireForce is not set to
       false, git clean will refuse to delete files or directories unless
       given -f, -n or -i. Git will refuse to delete directories with .git
       sub directory or file unless a second -f is given. This affects
       also git submodules where the storage area of the removed submodule
       under .git/modules/ is not removed until -f is given twice.

-x
       Don't use the standard ignore rules read from .gitignore (per
       directory) and $GIT_DIR/info/exclude, but do still use the ignore
       rules given with -e options. This allows removing all untracked
       files, including build products. This can be used (possibly in
       conjunction with git reset) to create a pristine working directory
       to test a clean build.

There are other flags as well available, just check git clean --help.