---
kind: change
title: Gitignore Templates API
created_at: 2012-11-29
author_name: pengwynn
---

We recently [made it easy][init-post] to initialize a repository when you create
it [via the API][repo-create]. One of the options you can pass when creating a
repository is `gitignore_template`. This value is the name of one of the
templates from the the public [GitHub .gitignore repository][templates-repo].

The [Gitignore Templates API][new-api] makes it easy to list those templates:

    curl https://api.github.com/gitignore/templates

    HTTP/1.1 200 OK

    [
      "Actionscript",
      "Android",
      "AppceleratorTitanium",
      "Autotools",
      "Bancha",
      "C",
      "C++",
      ...

If you'd like to view the source, you can also fetch a single template.

    curl -H 'Accept: application/vnd.github.raw' \
         https://api.github.com/gitignore/templates/Objective-C

    HTTP/1.1 200 OK

    # Xcode
    .DS_Store
    build/
    *.pbxuser
    !default.pbxuser
    *.mode1v3
    !default.mode1v3
    *.mode2v3
    !default.mode2v3
    *.perspectivev3
    !default.perspectivev3
    *.xcworkspace
    !default.xcworkspace
    xcuserdata
    profile
    *.moved-aside
    DerivedData
    .idea/

[init-post]: /changes/2012-9-28-auto-init-for-repositories/
[repo-create]: /v3/repos/#create
[templates-repo]: https://github.com/github/gitignore
[new-api]: /v3/gitignore/