Exclude all .git or .svn folders from Spotlight index

Solution 1:

It is possible to exclude a folder using the command-line.

From there try this:

• Open a Terminal window

• Type

  sudo defaults write /.Spotlight-V100/VolumeConfiguration.plist Exclusions -array-add 'path/to/exclude'

So I guess you can try this using xargs' magic:

sudo locate .git | xargs -I {} defaults write /.Spotlight-V100/VolumeConfiguration.plist Exclusions -array-add {}

You can check it worked using this:

sudo defaults read /.Spotlight-V100/VolumeConfiguration.plist Exclusions

You can remove all entries (there is no -array-remove option) using this:

sudo defaults write /.Spotlight-V100/VolumeConfiguration.plist Exclusions -array

Be careful with these commands, I don't know if there are side effects.

I could not really check this worked for my .git folders since none of them were displayed by spotlight search before nor after running these commands.