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I have a git repo: rsh:

❯ cat rsh/.gitignore *.o shell build/ rsh_history

And I'm attempting to tar it up using tar (GNU tar) 1.32.

The command I'm using is:

❯ gtar cvaf rsh.tar.gz --exclude-vcs-ignores --exclude-vcs rsh

Unfortunately, the build/ directory is included in the tarfile, in spite of build/ being specified in the .gitignore.

❯ gtar cvaf rsh.tar.gz --exclude-vcs-ignores --exclude-vcs rsh ... rsh/build/ rsh/build/meson-private/ rsh/build/meson-private/install.dat rsh/build/meson-private/meson.lock rsh/build/meson-private/sanitycheckc.exe rsh/build/meson-private/build.dat rsh/build/meson-private/sanitycheckc.c rsh/build/meson-private/cmd_line.txt rsh/build/meson-private/meson_benchmark_setup.dat rsh/build/meson-private/meson_test_setup.dat rsh/build/meson-private/coredata.dat rsh/build/compile_commands.json rsh/build/rsh rsh/build/rsh@exe/ rsh/build/.ninja_deps rsh/build/build.ninja rsh/build/meson-logs/ rsh/build/meson-logs/meson-log.txt rsh/build/meson-info/ rsh/build/meson-info/intro-buildsystem_files.json rsh/build/meson-info/intro-benchmarks.json rsh/build/meson-info/intro-buildoptions.json rsh/build/meson-info/intro-dependencies.json rsh/build/meson-info/intro-installed.json rsh/build/meson-info/meson-info.json rsh/build/meson-info/intro-tests.json rsh/build/meson-info/intro-projectinfo.json rsh/build/meson-info/intro-targets.json rsh/build/.ninja_log ...

Curiously enough, the .gitignore itself does get ignored (--exclude-vcs); as well the other files in the .gitignore (rsh_history).

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  • it might be a difference in interpretation of the .gitignore file. try either build/* or build/** rather than just build/. Commented Aug 24, 2019 at 6:59
  • @cas neither of those worked; not did build/**/* Commented Aug 24, 2019 at 7:01
  • try **/build/* - that's the only way I've been able to get it to exclude an entire subdirectory. note: this will also exclude build/* found in any lower level subdirs. Commented Aug 24, 2019 at 7:27
  • **/build and build also seem to work (and match non-directories too). I would add these workarounds additionally to the .gitignore with a comment like # needed for tar --exclude-vcs-ignores Commented Aug 24, 2019 at 7:34
  • if you write that up as an answer, i'll upvote it and you can accept it in a day or so. Commented Aug 24, 2019 at 9:28

2 Answers 2

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As mentioned in the comments to the question, both build and **/build work.

It should be noted though that this will also match in subdirectories. And as far as I've seen (someone please edit this answer if you know better), there is no way around this through either the .gitignore file or a simple command line option. Because tar doesn't understand either the leading slash syntax of git (so e.g. /build to match only build in the root directory), nor ! inclusions (e.g. !but_i_want_this_included/build).

The official docs say:

.gitignore

Contains shell-style globbing patterns. Applies to the directory where `.gitfile' is located and all its subdirectories.

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  • I wonder if someone should whine at gnu tar... their behavior does not match that of gits. Commented Nov 5, 2024 at 18:31
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If you need to only exclude directories in the same directory as the .gitignore file, you can add two rules in .gitignore:

# # exclude log directory in the same directory as .gitignore # # - for git /log/ # - and for the linux shell ./log

This way, git uses the entry with the leading / and does not match ./.

Shell-tools like tar on the other hand, can't handle leading /, but can interpret ./.

So your original command with the option --exclude-vcs-ignores will work.

There is one problem though:

This will only work, if you run tar from the same directory, where the .gitignore file is located. It will not work for other .gitignore files in directories below.

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  • will accept after confirming Commented Feb 12, 2020 at 16:11

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