How do I tell git to ignore files that start with a tilde?

Question

My text editor creates swap files that start with a tilde. I accidentally checked on of these into git. How do I tell git to ignore any files like this anywhere in my project tree?

So I had

/folder/another/file.txt
/folder/another/~file.txt

I want ~file.txt to be ignored by git.

Answer 1

Just use a .gitignore file:

echo '~*' >> .gitignore

Alternatively, you can also write this line to .git/info/exclude which is a project-wide local ignore file (which you obviously cannot check in, as you can do with .gitignore).

Answer 2

echo '~*' >> .gitignore

This will append the needed entry.

Else edit the .gitignore file manually and add ~* on a new line.