Git - How to ignore all files inside one directory recursively but some files with an specific extension

Question

I'm using Windows 7 with Git v2.8.3.

I have this directory structure which contains a Git repository.

testing_gitignore
│   .gitignore
│   file_1.txt
│   file_2.txt
│
├───dir_1
│       file_11.txt
│       file_12.txt
│       file_13.txt
│
└───dir_2
    │   file_21.txt
    │   file_22.txt
    │   file_23.xlsx
    │   file_24.txt
    │
    └───dir_21
            file_211.txt
            file_212.xlsx
            file_213.txt

I wanna configure the .gitignore file in order to ignore all files inside dir_2 recursively but keeping (for commit) the files with extension: .xlsx (recursively).

Inside .gitignore I used the following:

/dir_2/*
/dir_2/**/*
!/dir_2/*.xlsx
!/dir_2/**/*.xlsx

But I get no success because I get as files to commit the following list (which you can see also here):

.gitignore
file_1.txt
file_2.txt
dir_1\file_11.txt
dir_1\file_12.txt
dir_1\file_13.txt
dir_2\file_23.xlsx

but I expect it should be included (as file to commit) the file:

dir_2/dir_21/file_212.xlsx

Could you give me a .gitignore configuration to achieve this? (before posting here could you try it by yourself with the directory structure I attached before for download on the link?)

Answer 1

Try to ignore files but re-include folders:

/dir_2/**/*
!/dir_2/**/

(Note the /**/* of the first rule: it ignores all files and folders recursively, then re-include folders !/**/ in the second rule).

Then you can re-include files (because their folders are not ignored)

!/dir_2/**/*.xlsx

The main rule about .gitignore remains:

It is not possible to re-include a file if a parent directory of that file is excluded.

So ignoring files and folders (with '/**/*') means you won't be able re-include files unless their parent folders are themselves re-included (with !/**/: trailing slash means 'folders').
Full .gitignore:

/dir_2/**/*
!/dir_2/**/
!/dir_2/**/*.xlsx

Note that you don't have to commit a .gitignore to test its effect: modify it, and do a git status: as long as those files where not tracked (do a git rm -r --cached dir_2 first), the effect of those rules will be immediate.

With that .gitignore in place, do a git add ., and a git status: it should only show *.xlsx under dir_2/ as being added.

[ pay attention to the underscores ]