Trouble un-ignoring previously ignored files in Git repo

Question

I have a site that has a /sites/default/files/ directory where user content is typically kept. Figuring that I don't need to be tracking this stuff, I added /sites/default/files/ to my .gitignore file.

Then I discovered that I also wanted to keep some mostly-permanent uploads in that directory as well. Now it makes more sense to track everything in /sites/default/files/ and exclude undesirable subdirectories, instead of doing it the other way around.

The problem is that Git won't stop ignoring that directory. I have removed the lines from .gitignore that specify this directory and it won't track it. I have the option to use git add /sites/default/files/ -f to force git to track the directory, but I've done that before and it seems messy.

If .gitignore no longer specifies that directory as ignored, why would I have to force Git to start tracking those files?

Answer 1

You know how to do it already. Yes, git add -f is the way.

If you ask why... this is because git set a assume-unchanged bit internally. This bit make git think the file is not modified, so git add won't add it.

If you want to mess with the implementation details, you can use git update-index --no-assume-unchanged <file> command.