Remove git mapping in Visual Studio 2015

This question has nothing to do with git itself; rather, it has to do with removing a binding/mapping to a git repository that Visual Studio 2015 (VS2015) has previously seen.

Here's a screen shot of the problem:

Notice that the remove button is grayed out (disabled). How can I remove this entry from the "Local Git Repositories" list?

The solution is much simpler than that. You simply need to remove three files from the project UNC Path.

Navigate to your solution's UNC Path.

Example: C:\Users\Your User Name\Documents\Visual Studio 2015\Projects\Your Project Folder

Then permanently delete ("SHIFT + DEL") the .git* files and folder. There are two files and one folder, which may be hidden so ensure you have your folders and search options > View > show hidden files, folder, and drives (Radio Button) Selected.

The files to permanently delete are:

.gitignore (file)

.gitattributes (file)

.git (folder)

Reopen Visual Studio and there is no more relationship to the Git Source Control. If you wanted to take it as far as removing it from the registry as mentioned above, you could, but that shouldn't be necessary aside from the "house keeping" of your machine.

Tools -> Options -> Source Control -> Current Source Control Plug-in: None

Short Version

1. Remove the appropriate entr(y|ies) under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\14.0\TeamFoundation\GitSourceControl\Repositories.

2. Remove HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\14.0\TeamFoundation\GitSourceControl\General\LastUsedRepository if it's the same as the repo you are trying to remove.

Background

It seems like Visual Studio tracks all of the git repositories that it has seen. Even if you close the project that was referencing a repository, old entries may still appear in the list.

This problem is not new to Visual Studio:

VS2013 - How do I remove local git repository from team explorer window when option Remove is always disabled?

Remove Git binding from Visual Studio 2013 solution?

This all seems like a lot of work for something that should probably be a built-in feature. The above "solutions" mention making modifications to the .git file etc.; I don't like the idea of having to change things outside of Visual Studio to affect things inside Visual Studio. Although my solution needs to make a few registry edits (and is external to VS), at least these only affect VS. Here is the work-around (read: hack):

Detailed Instructions

Be sure to have Visual Studio 2015 closed before following these steps.

1. Open regedit.exe and navigate to

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\14.0\TeamFoundation\GitSourceControl\Repositories

You might see multiple "hash" values that represent the repositories that VS is tracking.

2. Find the git repository you want to remove from the list. Look at the name and path values to verify the correct repository to delete:

3. Delete the key (and corresponding subkeys).

(Optional: before deleting, you can right click and choose Export to back up this key in case you make a mistake.) Now, right click on the key (in my case this is AE76C67B6CD2C04395248BFF8EBF96C7AFA15AA9 and select Delete).

4. Check that the LastUsedRepository key points to "something else."

If the repository mapping you are trying to remove in the above steps is stored in LastUsedRepository, then you'll need to remove this key, also. First navigate to:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\14.0\TeamFoundation\GitSourceControl\General

and delete the key LastUsedRepository (the key will be re-created by VS if needed). If you are worried about removing the key, you can just modify the value and set it to an empty string:

When you open Visual Studio 2015 again, the git repository binding should not appear in the list anymore.