Create a .gitignore file on windows

As you know if you create a .gitignore file using windows explorer (or .htaccess or any other .something file) it will complain loudly.

The trick is to create a new file and call it :
.gitignore.

Notice the "." at the end. It is significant. Once you do that windows explorer will silently remove the trailing "." and you get exactly what you wanted ".gitignore"

Github tip: Subscribe for updates to a single Issue / Pull request

When you are active in the open source world working on a bunch of active projects notifications quickly become too large to manage. Here is an example:

Fortunately a way to mange this is to only look at the notifications for issues / pull requests you are participating in.

However many times you don't have a meaningful way to participate and you end up doing this:

Comment just to participate

Fortunately you don't need to do this. If you are watching a repository (because you are active in it) you will see the message "because you're subscribed to this repository" as shown:

You can upgrade a particular issue / pull request to "participating" by clicking unsubscribe then subscribe again. Now you will see the message "because you're subscribed to this thread" as shown:

That's it. Now it will show up in "participating" for your notifications and no one needs to know (or get notified about you subscribing).

Admittedly its intuitive and I only learnt it from experience. I haven't searched for this so perhaps it is a documented way.