title: Keep ignored files out of git status
body: <p>I would like to stop Git from showing ignored files in <code>git status</code>, because having tons of documentation and config files in the list of <em>Changed but not updated</em> files, renders the list half-useless.</p>
  
  <p>Is it normal for Git to show these files? </p>
  
  <p>I put the ignore information in a <code>.gitignore</code> file in the root directory of the Git repository and they are not added when using <code>git add .</code> but it seems that they are not fully ignored either, as they show up in the aforementioned list and <strong>do not</strong> show up in the list printed by <code>git ls-files --others -i --exclude-standard</code>. Only files matched by the patterns in <code>~/.gitignore</code> show up there.</p>
  
  <p>Could it be because at an earlier stage I didn't ignore them and they were thus committed at least once?</p>