Gitattributes

Git · Reference cheat sheet

📖 Overview

.gitattributes assigns attributes to paths: line-ending normalization, diff/merge drivers, linguist overrides, and Git LFS filters. Keep it committed so every clone behaves the same.

🧩 Core concepts

• text / eol — normalize LF in the repo; checkout lf or crlf per path.
• binary — skip text conversion/diff for binaries.
• diff / merge — custom drivers for generated or vendor files.
• export-ignore — omit paths from git archive.
• Linguist — linguist-language, linguist-vendored, linguist-generated for GitHub stats.
• LFS filter — filter=lfs diff=lfs merge=lfs -text for large files.

💡 Examples

# Normalize text; force LF in working tree for these
* text=auto eol=lf
*.sh text eol=lf
*.bat text eol=crlf
*.ps1 text eol=lf

# Binaries
*.png binary
*.jpg binary
*.pdf binary
*.zip binary

# Generated / vendored (GitHub Linguist)
dist/** linguist-generated=true
vendor/** linguist-vendored=true

# Custom diff for lockfiles (optional)
package-lock.json -diff
pnpm-lock.yaml -diff

# LFS (after git lfs track)
*.psd filter=lfs diff=lfs merge=lfs -text
*.mp4 filter=lfs diff=lfs merge=lfs -text

# Archives
docs/internal/** export-ignore

# Refresh working tree after attributes change
git add --renormalize .
git status

⚠️ Pitfalls

• Changing eol mid-project causes huge diffs unless you renormalize carefully.
• Marking text as binary hides useful diffs and can complicate merges.
• LFS patterns belong here and need git lfs install on each machine.
• Attributes are path-based — rename/move files can drop intended rules if patterns are too narrow.

🔗 Related

• Gitignore
• Git LFS
• Commit
• Merge
• Stage