Stop tracking of already tracked files

Why? One scenario: you write on a paper using LaTeX, compile the document, git add ., git commit -m "created pdf", git push, and then you recognize that all the files you are not interested in, i.e. basically all besides the .tex file are tracked…

First make sure to commit all changes in the repository to not accidentally lose any work.

1. put them in .gitignore

2. recursively clean the index

   git rm -r --cached . 
   

3. rebuild index

   git add .
   

4. commit your changes

   git commit -am "Remove ignored files"
   

Of course, I had help in finding this. Thanks Matt Frear