diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index 26d3394772..12dd3b49ea 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -23,9 +23,11 @@ report/
 .buildpath
 .externalToolBuilders
 .settings
+
 #ignore OSX .DS_Store files
 .DS_Store
 
+#ignore NetBeans IDE's private files (at least)
 /nbproject/private/
 
 #ignore smarty cache
@@ -60,3 +62,6 @@ vendor/*
 
 #ignore addons/ directory
 addons/
+
+#Ignore .htaccess as it may contain local changes
+.htaccess
diff --git a/.htaccess b/.htaccess-dist
similarity index 96%
rename from .htaccess
rename to .htaccess-dist
index 2348cdc38b..a671cc680a 100644
--- a/.htaccess
+++ b/.htaccess-dist
@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ AddType audio/ogg .oga
 #AddHandler php53-cgi .php
 
 <FilesMatch "\.(out|log)$">
-  <IfModule authz_host_module> 
+  <IfModule authz_host_module>
     #Apache 2.4
     Require all denied
   </IfModule>
@@ -38,4 +38,3 @@ AddType audio/ogg .oga
   RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php?pagename=$1 [E=REMOTE_USER:%{HTTP:Authorization},L,QSA]
 
 </IfModule>
-