How can I Remove .DS_Store files from a Git repository?

How can I remove those annoying Mac OS X .DS_Store files from a Git repository?

28 Answers

Remove existing files from the repository:

find . -name .DS_Store -print0 | xargs -0 git rm -f --ignore-unmatch

Add this line:

.DS_Store

to the file .gitignore, which can be found at the top level of your repository (or create the file if it isn't there already). You can do this easily with this command in the top directory:

echo .DS_Store >> .gitignore

Then commit the file to the repo:

git add .gitignore
git commit -m '.DS_Store banished!'

Combining benzado and webmat's answers, updating with git rm, not failing on files found that aren't in repo, and making it paste-able generically for any user:

# remove any existing files from the repo, skipping over ones not in repo
find . -name .DS_Store -print0 | xargs -0 git rm --ignore-unmatch
# specify a global exclusion list
git config --global core.excludesfile ~/.gitignore
# adding .DS_Store to that list
echo .DS_Store >> ~/.gitignore

The best solution to tackle this issue is to Globally ignore these files from all the git repos on your system. This can be done by creating a global gitignore file like:

vi ~/.gitignore_global

Adding Rules for ignoring files like:

# Compiled source #
###################
*.com
*.class
*.dll
*.exe
*.o
*.so
# Packages #
############
# it's better to unpack these files and commit the raw source
# git has its own built in compression methods
*.7z
*.dmg
*.gz
*.iso
*.jar
*.rar
*.tar
*.zip
# Logs and databases #
######################
*.log
*.sql
*.sqlite
# OS generated files #
######################
.DS_Store
.DS_Store?
._*
.Spotlight-V100
.Trashes
ehthumbs.db
Thumbs.db

Now, add this file to your global git config:

git config --global core.excludesfile ~/.gitignore_global

Edit:

Removed Icons as they might need to be committed as application assets.

In some situations you may also want to ignore some files globally. For me, .DS_Store is one of them. Here's how:

git config --global core.excludesfile /Users/mat/.gitignore

(Or any file of your choice)

Then edit the file just like a repo's .gitignore. Note that I think you have to use an absolute path.

If you are unable to remove the files because they have changes staged use:

git rm --cached -f *.DS_Store

Top voted answer is awesome, but helping out the rookies like me, here is how to create the .gitignore file, edit it, save it, remove the files you might have already added to git, then push up the file to Github.

Create the .gitignore file

To create a .gitignore file, you can just touch the file which creates a blank file with the specified name. We want to create the file named .gitignore so we can use the command:

touch .gitignore

Ignore the files

Now you have to add the line which tells git to ignore the DS Store files to your .gitignore. You can use the nano editor to do this.

nano .gitignore

Nano is nice because it includes instructions on how to get out of it. (Ctrl-O to save, Ctrl-X to exit)

Copy and paste some of the ideas from this Github gist which lists some common files to ignore. The most important ones, to answer this question, would be:

# OS generated files #
######################
.DS_Store
.DS_Store?

The # are comments, and will help you organize your file as it grows.

This Github article also has some general ideas and guidelines.

Remove the files already added to git

Finally, you need to actually remove those DS Store files from your directory.

Use this great command from the top voted answer. This will go through all the folders in your directory, and remove those files from git.

find . -name .DS_Store -print0 | xargs -0 git rm -f --ignore-unmatch

Push .gitignore up to Github

Last step, you need to actually commit your .gitignore file.

git status

git add .gitignore

git commit -m '.DS_Store banished!'

Sometimes .DS_Store files are there at remote repository, but not visible at your local project folders. To fix this, we need to remove all cached files and add again.

Step 1: Add this to .gitignore file.

# Ignore Mac DS_Store files
.DS_Store
**/.DS_Store

Step 2: Remove the cached files and add again using these commands.

git rm -r --cached .
git add .
git commit -am "Removed git ignored files"
git push -f origin master

Open terminal and type "cd < ProjectPath >"

Remove existing files:find . -name .DS_Store -print0 | xargs -0 git rm -f --ignore-unmatch
nano .gitignore
Add this .DS_Store
type "ctrl + x"
Type "y"
Enter to save file
git add .gitignore
git commit -m '.DS_Store removed.'

I had to change git-rm to git rm in the above to get it to work:

find . -depth -name '.DS_Store' -exec git rm --cached '{}' \; -print

The best way to get rid of this file forever:

Make a global .gitignore file:

echo .DS_Store >> ~/.gitignore_global

Let Git know that you want to use this file for all of your repositories:

git config --global core.excludesfile ~/.gitignore_global

That’s it! .DS_Store will be ignored in all repositories.

Use this command to remove the existing files:

find . -name '*.DS_Store' -type f -delete

Then add .DS_Store to .gitignore

In case you want to remove DS_Store files to every folder and subfolder:

In case of already committed DS_Store:

find . -name .DS_Store -print0 | xargs -0 git rm --ignore-unmatch

Ignore them by:

echo ".DS_Store" >> ~/.gitignore_global
echo "._.DS_Store" >> ~/.gitignore_global
echo "**/.DS_Store" >> ~/.gitignore_global
echo "**/._.DS_Store" >> ~/.gitignore_global
git config --global core.excludesfile ~/.gitignore_global

delete them using git-rm, and then add .DS_Store to .gitignore to stop them getting added again. You can also use blueharvest to stop them getting created all together

The following worked best for me. Handled unmatched files, and files with local modifications. For reference, this was on a Mac 10.7 system running git 1.7.4.4.

Find and remove:

find . -name .DS_Store -print0 | xargs -0 git rm --ignore-unmatch -f

I also globally ignore .DS_Store across all repositories by setting a global core.excludesfile.

First, create the file (if one doesn't already exist):

touch ~/.gitignore

Then add the following line and save:

.DS_Store

Now configure git to respect the file globally:

git config --global core.excludesfile ~/.gitignore

Step 1

This will remove every .DS_Store file in a directory (including subdirectories)

find . -name .DS_Store -print0 | xargs -0 git rm -f --ignore-unmatch

Step 2

Add this to .gitignore to prevent any DS_Store files in the root directory and every subdirectory from going to git!

**/.DS_Store

From the git docs:

A leading "**" followed by a slash means match in all directories. For example, "**/foo" matches file or directory "foo" anywhere, the same as pattern "foo". "**/foo/bar" matches file or directory "bar" anywhere that is directly under directory "foo".

I'm a bit late to the party, but I have a good answer. To remove the .DS_Store files, use the following commands from a terminal window, but be very careful deleting files with 'find'. Using a specific name with the -name option is one of the safer ways to use it:

cd directory/above/affected/workareas
find . -name .DS_Store -delete

You can leave off the "-delete" if you want to simply list them before and after. That will reassure you that they're gone.

With regard to the ~/.gitignore_global advice: be careful here. You want to place that nice file into .gitignore within the top level of each workarea and commit it, so that anyone who clones your repo will gain the benefit of its use.

I found that the following line from snipplr does best on wiping all .DS_Store, including one that has local modifications.

find . -depth -name '.DS_Store' -exec git-rm --cached '{}' \; -print

--cached option, keeps your local .DS_Store since it gonna be reproduced anyway.

And just like mentioned all above, add .DS_Store to .gitignore file on the root of your project. Then it will be no longer in your sight (of repos).

For some reason none of the above worked on my mac.

My solution is from the terminal run:

rm .DS_Store

Then run following command:

git pull origin master

This will work:

find . -name "*.DS_Store" -type f -exec git-rm {} \;

It deletes all files whose names end with .DS_Store, including ._.DS_Store.

When initializing your repository, skip the git command that contains

-u

and it shouldn't be an issue.

This worked for me, combo of two answers from above:

$ git rm --cached -f *.DS_Store
$ git commit -m "filter-branch --index-filter 'git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch .DS_Store"
$ git push origin master --force

Remove ignored files:

(.DS_Store)

$ find . -name .DS_Store -print0 | xargs -0 git rm --ignore-unmatch

$ git commit -m "filter-branch --index-filter 'git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch .DS_Store"
$ git push origin master --force

add this to your file .gitignore

#Ignore folder mac
.DS_Store

save this and make commit

git add -A
git commit -m "ignore .DS_Store"

and now you ignore this for all your commits

create a .gitignore file using command touch .gitignore

and add the following lines in it

.DS_Store

save the .gitignore file and then push it in to your git repo.

There are a few solutions to resolve this problem. To avoid creating .DS_Store files, do not to use the OS X Finder to view folders. An alternative way to view folders is to use UNIX command line. To remove the .DS_Store files a third-party product called DS_Store Terminator can be used. To delete the .DS_Store files from the entire system a UNIX shell command can be used. Launch Terminal from Applications:Utilities At the UNIX shell prompt enter the following UNIX command: sudo find / -name ".DS_Store" -depth -exec rm {} \; When prompted for a password enter the Mac OS X Administrator password.

This command is to find and remove all occurrences of .DS_Store starting from the root (/) of the file system through the entire machine. To configure this command to run as a scheduled task follow the steps below: Launch Terminal from Applications:Utilities At the UNIX shell prompt enter the following UNIX command:

sudo crontab -e When prompted for a password enter the Mac OS X Administrator password. Once in the vi editor press the letter I on your keyboard once and enter the following:

15 1 * * * root find / -name ".DS_Store" -depth -exec rm {} \;

This is called crontab entry, which has the following format:

Minute Hour DayOfMonth Month DayOfWeek User Command.

The crontab entry means that the command will be executed by the system automatically at 1:15 AM everyday by the account called root.

The command starts from find all the way to . If the system is not running this command will not get executed.

To save the entry press the Esc key once, then simultaneously press Shift + z+ z.

Note: Information in Step 4 is for the vi editor only.

No need to remove .DS_STORE locally

Just add it to .gitignore file