Git: how to push submodule to a remote repository?

Question

I use git to track website I\'m working on. I work on my machine and push commits to a remote server configured following this guide: using Git to manage a website.

Answer 1

I had a similar problem: a clone of a repo in a PC (A) with remote in an external website and I wanted to have a clone of my local repo in another PC (B) in the same network where I could push my changes to (through ssh) and make some tests (some of my regression test take a very long time), so that I could keep on working on (A) on an different branch if needed. The repo in (A) has a submodule.

I created bare repo in (B):

mkdir /path/to/bare_git && cd /path/to/bare_git
git --bare init

and added it as a new remote in my local repo in (A):

git add remote name_of_B_repo ssh://user@host/path/to/bare_git/

and pushed the local repo in (A) (possibly with changes not made public yet) to my ssh repo:

git push name_of_B_repo branch_to_push

After this, I clone my bare repo from within (B):

mkdir /path/to/B_clone && cd /path/to/B_clone
git clone /path/to/bare_git
git submodule update --remote

and I could see that my submodule was not included.

Solution 1: If you are not interesting in testing/changing the content of your submodule, but you need it to make your tests, then you can include the external website link directly in the .git/config of (B) clone as:

[submodule]
        url = http://submodule_external_website_url

then, just update your submodule:

git submodule update --remote

Solution 2: If you are interested in changing the content of the submodule in (A) and send them to (B), you first need to add the ssh repo in (B) to your local (A) submodule repo as a new remote:

cd /path/to/submodule
git add remote name_of_B_repo ssh://user@host/path/to/bare_git/

push your changes to it:

cd /path/to/main_A_local_repo
git submodule foreach git push name_of_B_repo branch_to_push

add the submodule local path to the .git/config file of clone repo in (B) as:

[submodule]
        url = /path/to/bare_git

and update your modules as before:

git submodule update --remote