This makes the default .gitignore include redundant rule for .godot/. It should be removed at least from here I think:

To be clear, this does not assume that users will always use git, but provide a safe default behavior whenever the project is added to git. Any project will work. Projects can be those that didn't select Git during creation, or even those not created by the standard project manager.

It's different from generating the file in the project root since .godot is opaque to the user. Now the request to ignore it is self-contained.

Could the /android/ folder also generate a similar .gitignore when Godot creates it?

In this case, we wouldn't need a top-level .gitignore anymore at all. That said, this might confuse users, so maybe it's not a good idea to do all this in the end.

I think adding the same in the /android/ folder makes sense.

I would keep .godot in the top-level .gitignore though, unless it causes actual issues. This one is likely to be seen and used by Godot users, and it currently conveys clearly that .godot ought to be ignored in Git. I think it's more explicit in a top-level .gitignore (which users expect in a Git repo) than in a subfolder (which most users might miss).

Updated.

• /android/.gitignore will now be created when installing the Android build template.
• The entries in the root .gitignore file are kept but commented out so that we only have one source of truth.

# Godot 4+ specific ignores
# The following directories are ignored in each directory's `.gitignore`.
#.godot/
#/android/

with this PR it's effectively no longer possible (but IMO it's not a problem).

Ignored files can be added by using the -f option.

git add -f .godot

Yeah, but you'll need to do it every time. And not sure if it's easily possible when using git GUI (e.g. in VS Code).