[Chore] Unnecessary GeoServer Config Files Are Being Stored in Version Control

[im-samwong]

Description

Currently, not all files inside apps/geoserver_data/ need to be tracked in version control. Some configuration files and dynamically generated data should be excluded to avoid unnecessary repository bloat and potential conflicts.

Expected Behavior:

• Only essential configuration files should be tracked.
• Auto-generated and runtime files should be ignored.

Current Behavior:

• Some unnecessary files in apps/geoserver_data/ are included in version control, which should instead be added to .gitignore.
• This increases repository size and causes potential merge conflicts when different users have their own runtime configurations.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Run GeoServer and check which files get modified in apps/geoserver_data/.
2. Observe that certain files are not needed for version control.
3. These files persist across different environments and shouldn't be manually managed.

Potential Fix:

• Identify which files are essential (e.g., core configurations) and which are dynamically generated.
• Update .gitignore to exclude non-essential files while keeping the necessary configurations for reproducibility.
• Ensure team members remove unnecessary files from the repository once the .gitignore is updated.

Priority: 🔹 Low to Medium (Improves repo cleanliness, avoids unnecessary file tracking).

[PFratt]

We also need to remove unnecessary test data from GeoServer.