Command Line .gitignore

I create a lot of projects for instructional purposes, game jams, and prototypes and I find myself often going to gitignore.io to grab the latest recommended Unity gitignore as a starting point. If you find yourself in a similar situation, you might find it more helpful to have access to gitignore.io via command line. In this post I'll go through how I make this possible on Windows via PowerShell. Let's get started. PowerShell Profile If you're unfamiliar with PowerShell, understand that there is a special script called your profile that is automatically executed every time you start a PowerShell session and we can use it to customize our PowerShell environment. If you come from Linux or macOS, think of this as the PowerShell equivalent of a .zshrc or .bashrc file. Writing A New Function Inside the profile script, I created a new function called Get-GitIgnore that is capable of two things. First, if I call it to get the latest Unity .gitignore file, it will download the file and write it at the current $PWD location. Second, it can pass an argument to show preview gitignore files in the console. Below is the recommended function from Toptal. I'll get into my customizations next. #For PowerShell v3 Function gig { param( [Parameter(Mandatory=$true)] [string[]]$list ) $params = ($list | ForEach-Object { [uri]::EscapeDataString($_) }) -join "," Invoke-WebRequest -Uri "https://www.toptal.com/developers/gitignore/api/$params" | select -ExpandProperty content | Out-File -FilePath $(Join-Path -path $pwd -ChildPath ".gitignore") -Encoding ascii } The function can then ne used in a new PowerShell session like so: gig unity Adding Preview Support This is a great start, but this will always write a .gitignore file. Sometimes I just want to preview the files in the console before writing them out. Here's my updated version. Function Get-GitIgnore { param( [Parameter(Mandatory = $true)] [string[]]$list, [Parameter()] [bool]$Preview = $false ) $params = ($list | ForEach-Object { [uri]::EscapeDataString($_) }) -join "," $uri = "https://www.toptal.com/developers/gitignore/api/$params" $content = Invoke-WebRequest -Uri $uri | Select-Object -ExpandProperty Content if ($Preview) { Write-Output $content } else { $filePath = Join-Path -Path $PWD -ChildPath ".gitignore" $content | Out-File -FilePath $filePath -Encoding ascii } } First, you'll notice I made some misc. updates to naming and capitalization, but let's focus on the preview changes. The new $Preview defaults to false so it works just like the original if no argument value is provided. Then I simply Write-Output if we pass -Preview $true, otherwise a file is created. Get-GitIgnore unity -Preview $true Summary Hopefully someone finds this helpful. Not a long post today but know that I'll be back to our usual game dev related content soon. Until next time. Take care. Stay awesome.

Apr 9, 2025 - 13:08

I create a lot of projects for instructional purposes, game jams, and prototypes and I find myself often going to gitignore.io to grab the latest recommended Unity gitignore as a starting point.

If you find yourself in a similar situation, you might find it more helpful to have access to gitignore.io via command line. In this post I'll go through how I make this possible on Windows via PowerShell. Let's get started.

PowerShell Profile

If you're unfamiliar with PowerShell, understand that there is a special script called your profile that is automatically executed every time you start a PowerShell session and we can use it to customize our PowerShell environment. If you come from Linux or macOS, think of this as the PowerShell equivalent of a .zshrc or .bashrc file.

Writing A New Function

Inside the profile script, I created a new function called Get-GitIgnore that is capable of two things. First, if I call it to get the latest Unity .gitignore file, it will download the file and write it at the current $PWD location. Second, it can pass an argument to show preview gitignore files in the console.

Below is the recommended function from Toptal. I'll get into my customizations next.

#For PowerShell v3
Function gig {
  param(
    [Parameter(Mandatory=$true)]
    [string[]]$list
  )
  $params = ($list | ForEach-Object { [uri]::EscapeDataString($_) }) -join ","
  Invoke-WebRequest -Uri "https://www.toptal.com/developers/gitignore/api/$params" | select -ExpandProperty content | Out-File -FilePath $(Join-Path -path $pwd -ChildPath ".gitignore") -Encoding ascii
}

The function can then ne used in a new PowerShell session like so:

gig unity

Adding Preview Support

This is a great start, but this will always write a .gitignore file. Sometimes I just want to preview the files in the console before writing them out. Here's my updated version.

Function Get-GitIgnore {
  param(
    [Parameter(Mandatory = $true)]
    [string[]]$list,

    [Parameter()]
    [bool]$Preview = $false
  )

  $params = ($list | ForEach-Object { [uri]::EscapeDataString($_) }) -join ","
  $uri = "https://www.toptal.com/developers/gitignore/api/$params"
  $content = Invoke-WebRequest -Uri $uri | Select-Object -ExpandProperty Content 

  if ($Preview) { 
      Write-Output $content
  }
  else {
     $filePath = Join-Path -Path $PWD -ChildPath ".gitignore"
     $content | Out-File -FilePath $filePath -Encoding ascii
  }
}

First, you'll notice I made some misc. updates to naming and capitalization, but let's focus on the preview changes.

The new $Preview defaults to false so it works just like the original if no argument value is provided. Then I simply Write-Output if we pass -Preview $true, otherwise a file is created.

Get-GitIgnore unity -Preview $true

Summary

Hopefully someone finds this helpful. Not a long post today but know that I'll be back to our usual game dev related content soon.

Until next time.

Take care.
Stay awesome.