I have spent some time chasing the wild goose (well - the .gitignore file) after getting: $> git-submodule add --name fcx-1 ./fcx-1/ ./fcx-1/ The following path is ignored by one of your .gitignore files: fcx-1 Use -f if you really want to add it. long story short -- the culprit is this piece of code in git-submodule: if test -z "$force" && ! git add --dry-run --ignore-missing "$sm_path" > /dev/null 2>&1 then eval_gettextln "The following path is ignored by one of your .gitignore files: \$sm_path Use -f if you really want to add it." >&2 exit 1 fi so if anything goes wrong in git add, it just reports this error message. FTR -- actual problem in my case was: $> git add --dry-run --ignore-missing fcx-1 fatal: Unable to create '/mnt/datasets/datalad/crawl/crcns/.git/index.lock': File exists. Another git process seems to be running in this repository, e.g. an editor opened by 'git commit'. Please make sure all processes are terminated then try again. If it still fails, a git process may have crashed in this repository earlier: remove the file manually to continue. ;-) Cheers! P.S. Please CC me in replies -- Yaroslav O. Halchenko Center for Open Neuroscience http://centerforopenneuroscience.org Dartmouth College, 419 Moore Hall, Hinman Box 6207, Hanover, NH 03755 Phone: +1 (603) 646-9834 Fax: +1 (603) 646-1419 WWW: http://www.linkedin.com/in/yarik