"Staged" files are files that have been changed and will be tracked in the
future. If you create a new file in a directory under version control, it
will be "unstaged". If you `git add <file>' it will then be "staged". (i.e.
added to the commit, and tracked by git). At this point your .gitignore is
staged, and future changes will be tracked by git. So, `git reset <file>'
should do the trick, but in any case `git rm --cached <file>', certainly
will.

On Tue, May 26, 2015, 7:32 PM Artur Malabarba <bruce.connor.am@gmail.com>
wrote:

>
> > git status returns the following obscure "information":
> >
> >     On branch master
> >     Your branch is up-to-date with 'origin/master'.
> >     Unmerged paths:
> >       (use "git reset HEAD <file>..." to unstage)
> >       (use "git add <file>..." to mark resolution)
> >
> >             both modified:   .gitignore
> >
> > .  I don't think I want to "unstage" anything (whatever that might
> > mean) - IIUC, the suggested recipe would discard all my changes.  I think
> > I might want to "mark resolution" (assuming this gobbledegook means
> > "mark <file> as resolved"),
>
> Yes. Then you need to commit.
>
> > but the suggested recipe, as far as I am
> > aware, doesn't "mark resolution", instead it moves a file into a list of
> > files to be committed in the (?near) future.
>
> That's the same thing. You git add all the conflict-solved files, and then
> commit to finish the merge. I may be missremembering things (been using
> Magit for so long I'm slowly forgetting the details), but I'm pretty sure
> that's it. :-)
>