BBEdit not showing .git folder, or other hidden "dot" files

[Scott]

Hi guys, hope you are all well!

So, this has never worked for me over the years, and I'm finally frustrated enough to start a thread here. lol

I do indeed have "Show everything" checked under the magnifying glass. Also, there is no combination of checked items under the magnifying glass that will show the '.git' folder.

Steps to reproduce:

- create new folder

- open terminal and 'cd' into that folder

- do 'git init'

- in finder, drag folder onto BBEdit to open

- confirm magnifying glass set to 'Show everything'

- confirm no '.git' folder seen

The only way I can get it to show the '.git' folder is to:

- actually *create* a new project (which I don't want)

- right click to 'Add items'

- add the parent folder

- right click on parent folder, select 'Add items' and manually choose the '.git' folder there.

I'm currently on version 15.5.4 (15C114, 64-bit Intel).

Thanks for any help you can give!

Scott

[Bruce Van Allen]

Do you have any file filters (usually made for multi-file searches) that might be excluding .git or any .x files?

— Bruce

_bruce__van_allen__santa_cruz_ca_

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[Rich Siegel]

On 28 Jun 2026, at 17:21, Scott wrote:

> So, this has never worked for me over the years, and I'm finally frustrated
> enough to start a thread here. lol

For reference, "sup...@barebones.com" has been in service since day one, and we're always happy to answer questions there.

> I do indeed have "Show everything" checked under the magnifying glass.
> Also, there is no combination of checked items under the magnifying glass
> that will show the '.git' folder.

By default, BBEdit does not display `.git` or other administrative directories used by various SCM systems.

You can turn on an expert preference to enable a command on the file filter menu (behind the magnifying glass) which will give you control over this:

defaults write com.barebones.bbedit ShowSCMDataCommandIsVisible -bool true

This takes effect immediately; there is no need to restart the application.

R.

--
Rich Siegel Bare Bones Software, Inc.
<sie...@barebones.com> <https://www.barebones.com/>

Someday I'll look back on all this and laugh... until they sedate me.