OpenSpec for foreign or forks of projects

[mipmip]

I'm trying to solve the idea I have for using OpenSpec in projects which will not allow the OpenSpec integration. Maybe having a global OpenSpec dir with spec from all foreign projects I'm working on. Of course OpenSpec should check for the existance if this project and automatically use this location for reading and storing artifacts. You don't want leave any openspec file left behind in the fereign project dir as you might accidentally commit this with git.

Anyone thinking about this case?

[mipmip]

Just to answer my own question. If you are working a fork of someones project and still want to use OpenSpec, you can do the following:

edit .git/info/exclude and add the openspec directory:

# git ls-files --others --exclude-from=.git/info/exclude
# Lines that start with '#' are comments.
# For a project mostly in C, the following would be a good set of
# exclude patterns (uncomment them if you want to use them):
# *.[oa]
# *~
.claude
openspec

Naturally this also works for your .claude and other dirs.

Full power in your forks without bothering others with your garbage.

[mipmip]

Another method would be to place a .gitignore file inside the openspec directory with this contents:

/*

This works on the principle that git does not track empty directories and this file inside openspec/ tells git to ignore all files inside openspec/. I stole this idea from Jujutsu, how they hide their .jj directory

[clay-good]

Your own two answers are the right ones for the in-repo case — .git/info/exclude or a /* .gitignore inside openspec/ both work and leave nothing behind in someone else's project. Thanks for coming back and writing them up.

For the shape you actually described — one dir holding specs for several foreign projects — that now exists as the beta stores feature: a standalone repo whose only job is planning, registered by name on your machine, that any code repo can point at. Nothing is written into the foreign checkout at all.

Stores User Guide (beta — flags and formats may still change).

Closing as answered — reopen or comment if your case is different.