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gitgitignore

.gitignore whitelist on directory and its contents


I'm trying to whitelist the directory (and its contents) SupplierName in my Zend Framework 2 vendor directory.

The original .gitignore file in /vendor looks like this:

# Add here the vendor path to be whitelisted
# Ex: for composer directory write here "!composer" (without quotes)
!.gitignore
*

Now I'd like to whitelist the directory SupplierName which shouldn't be too hard I thought. I have read the docs on gitignore and tried the following configurations:

First try, add !SupplierName right after the comment which says that I have to add the whitelisted path here.

# Add here the vendor path to be whitelisted
!SupplierName
# Ex: for composer directory write here "!composer" (without quotes)
!.gitignore
*

Right after that I executed git status which didn't show the vendor/SupplierName directory. git add vendor/SupplierName showed the following message:

The following paths are ignored by one of your .gitignore files: vendor/SupplierName

Second try

# Add here the vendor path to be whitelisted
# Ex: for composer directory write here "!composer" (without quotes)
!SupplierName
!.gitignore
*

Right after that I executed git status which didn't show the vendor/SupplierName directory. git add vendor/SupplierName showed the following message:

The following paths are ignored by one of your .gitignore files: vendor/SupplierName

Third try

# Add here the vendor path to be whitelisted
# Ex: for composer directory write here "!composer" (without quotes)
!.gitignore
*
!SupplierName

Right after that I executed git status which didn't show the vendor/SupplierName directory. git add vendor/SupplierName seems to work. But now, when I want to add the Module.php file (and some other files, subdirectories, etc) the following happens. git add vendor/SupplierName/Module.php -->

The following paths are ignored by one of your .gitignore files: vendor/SupplierName/Module.php

# Add here the vendor path to be whitelisted
# Ex: for composer directory write here "!composer" (without quotes)
*
!.gitignore
!SupplierName
!SupplierName/
!SupplierName/*

Allows me to add files directly in vendor/SupplierName, but git add vendor/SupplierName/config/module.config.php still results in

The following paths are ignored by one of your .gitignore files: vendor/SupplierName/config/module.config.php

I've been searching for problems regarding recursive whitelisting, because that seems to be the problem, but nothing came up.


Solution

  • You can use 2 .gitignore files to achieve the desired result:

    # vendor/.gitignore
    *
    !.gitignore
    !SupplierName/
    !SupplierName/*
    
    # vendor/SupplierName/.gitignore
    !*
    

    I tested this with a test repo and seems to work for me in adding files as many levels deep underneath the vendor/SupplierName directory.

    $ git add .
    
    $ git status
    # On branch master
    # Changes to be committed:
    #   (use "git reset HEAD <file>..." to unstage)
    #
    #   modified:   vendor/.gitignore
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/.gitignore
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/a
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/b
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/c
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/d
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir1/d
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir1/dir4/dir5/dir6/dir7/dir8/dir9/dir10/somefile
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir1/dir4/f1
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir1/dir4/f2
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir1/dir4/f3
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir1/dir4/f4
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir1/e
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir1/f
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir3/dir6/f5
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir3/dir6/f6
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir3/dir6/f7
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/dir3/dir7/f8
    #   new file:   vendor/SupplierName/e
    #