Git share subset of files from repo, retain no info on other files that were in repo

Question

I am trying to share some code that was previously in a git repository, but I simply want to just share the files. So, I copied and pasted the files to a new directory with no .git file. If I try rm -r .git, it says no such file.

However, when I run git log, I see the full log from the previous repo, which makes me wonder, what else is in there? Some of the files that were previously in that repo are sensitive, and I do not want to share them, so I wanted to remove anything that might be linked to them. Eg, if git log still works, I wonder if somehow someone could check out one of the old files, sensitive files? Just trying to be extra careful.

In other words, git is kind of a black box to me; I am not sure what information it has stored regarding old files in the repo. Now I just want to share a subset of these files, but some of the git commands still work, so I am paranoid that somehow I will accidentally share info from the old files. How does one go about completely removing everything? I tried git init, so now it has overwritten the log, but not sure if that's failsafe.

Answer 1

.git is at the root directory and what ever is under the root is tracked by git.

Copy your subset of file to completely a new directory.

Following is one easy way to see which place is "safe".

run git status and cd .. commands until you see fatal: not a git repository (or any of the parent directories): .git error.

Create a temp directory there and copy your subset of files.

Just to test, run git status in that temp directory and you should get fatal: not a git repository (or any of the parent directories): .git .