Sometimes we need to remove file from git repository, completely remove from repository. For example it can be property file with passwords 🙂
just remove
this approach will remove file from head of repository, but we still can have access to passwords in history commits.
git rm application.properties
git commit --amend --no-edit
completely remove
To completely remove file from repository
git filter-branch --tree-filter 'rm -f application.properties' HEAD
it will remove “application.properties” from every commit, but it will rewrite all history
use --prune-empty to remove empty commits
use git push --force to push changes
also can be used as
git filter-branch --force --index-filter 'git rm -r --cached --ignore-unmatch application.properties' --prune-empty --tag-name-filter cat -- --all
other approaches
One more way to remove file from git, but keep it on filesystem:
git rm --cached application.properties
echo application.properties >> .gitignore
git add .gitignore
git commit --amend --no-edit
🙂