# making use of $sm_path @ git submodule foreach —recursive

3 messages from 2022-11-27 to 2022-11-28. Participants: signal@dynax.at, Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason.
Thread: https://gitlist.dev/t/58863

## signal@dynax.at, 2022-11-27 22:53

Subject: making use of $sm_path @ git submodule foreach —recursive
Message-ID: <70ED2ECF-DAF1-4CCB-9E05-2599211F3569@dynax.at>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/70ED2ECF-DAF1-4CCB-9E05-2599211F3569%40dynax.at

```
Hi,

when using 
git submodule foreach —recursive [..] 
$sm_path contains only the relative part of the latest recursion. Since the command has no generic way of knowing from which recursion level it is executed any $sm_path of deeper recursion level is useless unless there is a way for the command to find out from which recursion it is called.

I suggest $sm_path should be extended to be relative to the repo from where the submodule recursion started or another variable should contain the recursive part.

Viele Grüße/Cheers,
Hagen.

```

## Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, 2022-11-28 12:43

Subject: Re: making use of $sm_path @ git submodule foreach —recursive
Message-ID: <221128.86r0xnkzyw.gmgdl@evledraar.gmail.com>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/221128.86r0xnkzyw.gmgdl%40evledraar.gmail.com
In-Reply-To: <70ED2ECF-DAF1-4CCB-9E05-2599211F3569@dynax.at>

```

On Sun, Nov 27 2022, signal@dynax.at wrote:

> Hi,
>
> when using 
> git submodule foreach —recursive [..] 
> $sm_path contains only the relative part of the latest
> recursion. Since the command has no generic way of knowing from which
> recursion level it is executed any $sm_path of deeper recursion level
> is useless unless there is a way for the command to find out from
> which recursion it is called.
>
> I suggest $sm_path should be extended to be relative to the repo from where the submodule recursion started or another variable should contain the recursive part.
>
> Viele Grüße/Cheers,
> Hagen.

I think it might be sensible to have a $super_prefix_sm_path or
something which does what you suggest here.

But the current "$sm_path" is far from useless, it's just not useful for
what you're trying to do.

When we run a command in sub1/sub2 or whatever the "$sm_path" will be
"sub1", then as we cd to "sub1" it'll be "sub2".

You want "sub1/sub2" there, but a "sub2" is still useful, because we've
chdir()'d to the "sub1" at that point.

So you can e.g. run 'git -C "$sm_path" log' in your 'foreach', or
another command that expects to get the *relative* submodule path.

If we simply changed how "$sm_path" works that would break, and if we
"fixed" that by not chdir()-ing from the super-project we'd break even
more things, as e.g.:

	git submodule foreach 'git pull'

Or whatever wouldn't behave as you'd expect.

```

## signal@dynax.at, 2022-11-28 14:18

Subject: Re: making use of $sm_path @ git submodule foreach —recursive
Message-ID: <DEE63B3B-95B2-469B-AC02-CAC1B5FCAC67@dynax.at>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/DEE63B3B-95B2-469B-AC02-CAC1B5FCAC67%40dynax.at
In-Reply-To: <221128.86r0xnkzyw.gmgdl@evledraar.gmail.com>

```
Oh, thanks! I didn’t notice that it chdir’ed into the submodule folder! Then clearly this is the relation I was looking for!
Thanks! sorry for the noise!

> On 28.11.2022, at 13:43, Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason <avarab@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> On Sun, Nov 27 2022, signal@dynax.at wrote:
> 
>> Hi,
>> 
>> when using 
>> git submodule foreach —recursive [..] 
>> $sm_path contains only the relative part of the latest
>> recursion. Since the command has no generic way of knowing from which
>> recursion level it is executed any $sm_path of deeper recursion level
>> is useless unless there is a way for the command to find out from
>> which recursion it is called.
>> 
>> I suggest $sm_path should be extended to be relative to the repo from where the submodule recursion started or another variable should contain the recursive part.
>> 
>> Viele Grüße/Cheers,
>> Hagen.
> 
> I think it might be sensible to have a $super_prefix_sm_path or
> something which does what you suggest here.
> 
> But the current "$sm_path" is far from useless, it's just not useful for
> what you're trying to do.
> 
> When we run a command in sub1/sub2 or whatever the "$sm_path" will be
> "sub1", then as we cd to "sub1" it'll be "sub2".
> 
> You want "sub1/sub2" there, but a "sub2" is still useful, because we've
> chdir()'d to the "sub1" at that point.
> 
> So you can e.g. run 'git -C "$sm_path" log' in your 'foreach', or
> another command that expects to get the *relative* submodule path.
> 
> If we simply changed how "$sm_path" works that would break, and if we
> "fixed" that by not chdir()-ing from the super-project we'd break even
> more things, as e.g.:
> 
> 	git submodule foreach 'git pull'
> 
> Or whatever wouldn't behave as you'd expect.


```