This patch explains more carefully that `.gitignore` concerns only untracked files and refers the reader to git update-index --assume-unchanged in the need of ignoring uncommitted changes in already tracked files. The description of this option is lifted to a more "porcelainish" level and explains the caveats of this usecase. Whether feasible or not, I believe adding this functionality to the porcelain is out of the scope of this patch. (And I personally think that referring to the plumbing in the case of such a special usage is fine.) This is currently probably one of the top FAQs at #git and the --assume-unchanged switch is not widely known; gitignore(5) is the first place where people are likely to look for it. Signed-off-by: Petr Baudis <pasky@xxxxxxx> --- Documentation/git-update-index.txt | 10 ++++++++++ Documentation/gitignore.txt | 11 ++++++++--- 2 files changed, 18 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-) diff --git a/Documentation/git-update-index.txt b/Documentation/git-update-index.txt index a91fd21..6b930bc 100644 --- a/Documentation/git-update-index.txt +++ b/Documentation/git-update-index.txt @@ -88,6 +88,16 @@ OPTIONS sometimes helpful when working with a big project on a filesystem that has very slow lstat(2) system call (e.g. cifs). ++ +This option can be also used as a coarse file-level mechanism +to ignore uncommitted changes in tracked files (akin to what +`.gitignore` does for untracked files). +You should remember that an explicit 'git add' operation will +still cause the file to be refreshed from the working tree. +Git will fail (gracefully) in case it needs to modify this file +in the index e.g. when merging in a commit; +thus, in case the assumed-untracked file is changed upstream, +you will need to handle the situation manually. -g:: --again:: diff --git a/Documentation/gitignore.txt b/Documentation/gitignore.txt index fc0efd8..59321a2 100644 --- a/Documentation/gitignore.txt +++ b/Documentation/gitignore.txt @@ -13,9 +13,14 @@ DESCRIPTION ----------- A `gitignore` file specifies intentionally untracked files that -git should ignore. Each line in a `gitignore` file specifies a -pattern. - +git should ignore. +Note that all the `gitignore` files really concern only files +that are not already tracked by git; +in order to ignore uncommitted changes in already tracked files, +please refer to the 'git update-index --assume-unchanged' +documentation. + +Each line in a `gitignore` file specifies a pattern. When deciding whether to ignore a path, git normally checks `gitignore` patterns from multiple sources, with the following order of precedence, from highest to lowest (within one level of -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe git" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
