Why doesn't Git ignore my specified file?

Question

I added the following line to .gitignore:

sites/default/settings.php

but when I type git status it shows the file

Answer 1

Just in case anyone in the future has the same problem that I did:

If you use the

*
!/**/
!*.*

trick to remove binary files with no extension, make sure that ALL other gitignore lines are BELOW. Git will read from .gitignore from the top, so even though I had 'test.go' in my gitignore, it was first in the file, and became 'unignored' after

!*.*