How to permanently delete a file stored in GIT?

I backed up my database to GIT just so I could get the db at my home computer.

I don't want this file to be versioned, it was just a 1 time thing really.

Can I delete it for good so GIT doesn't keep track of it going forward or historically?

I always find Guides: Completely remove a file from all revisions feed helpful.

> To remove the file called Rakefile: > > git filter-branch --force --index-filter
>   'git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch Rakefile'
>   --prune-empty --tag-name-filter cat -- --all This command will run the entire history of every branch and tag, changing any commit > that involved the file Rakefile, and any commits afterwards. Commits > that are empty afterwards (because they only changed the Rakefile) are > removed entirely.

Update for remote repository:

git filter-branch -f --index-filter "git rm -rf --cached --ignore-unmatch FOLDERNAME" -- --all

replace FOLDERNAME with the file or folder you wish to remove from the given git repository.

rm -rf .git/refs/original/

git reflog expire --expire=now --all

git gc --prune=now

git gc --aggressive --prune=now

Now push all the changes to the remote repository

git push --all --force

This would clean up the remote repository.

You can also use bfg for ease.

>The BFG is a simpler, faster alternative to git-filter-branch for cleansing bad data out of your Git repository history:

Removing Crazy Big Files Removing Passwords, Credentials & other Private data

$ bfg --delete-files YOUR-FILE-WITH-SENSITIVE-DATA

Or just replace all the occurrences of some file:

$ bfg --replace-text passwords.txt

check https://rtyley.github.io/bfg-repo-cleaner/ and https://help.github.com/articles/removing-sensitive-data-from-a-repository/

You can with git filter-branch's --index-filter.

I would like to share most simplest and easy to understand solution which worked for me.

First clone a fresh copy of your repo, using the --mirror flag:

git clone --mirror https://github.com/username/youproject.git

Then Download latest version of BFG jar file from https://rtyley.github.io/bfg-repo-cleaner/ rename it as bfg.jar and paste it inside YourRepoName.git folder.

Then run following lines in git bash.

java -jar bfg.jar --delete-files yourfilename (only file name is needed, no need to mention path)

git reflog expire --expire=now --all && git gc --prune=now --aggressive (it will strip out the unwanted dirty data which has been expelled out due to above command)

I faced issue here. My project was having open pull requests. If there are any open pull requests then you need to run this command

git show-ref | cut -d' ' -f2 | grep 'pull-request' | xargs -r -L1 git update-ref -d

After this you can simply push master branch.

git push -u origin master

Its done. But remember to keep a copy in local of old repository before performing above action. All unmerged branches and open pull requests may get deleted.

I reduced my repo size from 40mb to 4mb by removing unwanted apk files which got pushed with my commits.