Submodule confusion when checking out branch

2 messages, 2 authors, 2016-06-15 · open the first message on its own page

Submodule confusion when checking out branch

From: Howard Miller <hidden>
Date: 2016-06-15 22:52:13

I added a submodule to my project like this (all from the root of the project)

git submodule add git@.....   path/to/submodule
git submodule init
git add path/to/submodule
git commit -m 'I added a submodule!'
git push

All looks good and 'git status' reports 'nothing to commit'

However, I now cannot change branches. On checkout, I get...

"error: The following untracked working tree files would be
overwritten by checkout:"
(followed by a big list of all the files in the submodule)

Where did I go wrong and what can I do to sort it?

Thanks again!

Re: Submodule confusion when checking out branch

From: Jens Lehmann <hidden>
Date: 2016-06-15 22:52:13

Am 11.10.2011 11:38, schrieb Howard Miller:
I added a submodule to my project like this (all from the root of the project)

git submodule add git@.....   path/to/submodule
git submodule init
git add path/to/submodule
git commit -m 'I added a submodule!'
git push

All looks good and 'git status' reports 'nothing to commit'

However, I now cannot change branches. On checkout, I get...

"error: The following untracked working tree files would be
overwritten by checkout:"
(followed by a big list of all the files in the submodule)

Where did I go wrong and what can I do to sort it?
Hmm, as I don't know for what checkout you see this problem (do you
switch from a branch containing the submodule to one that doesn't
have it or the other way round?) and assuming you had some files
committed in the directory where the submodule lives I can take a
guess what happened:

Could it be the case that you converted an existing directory into a
submodule and then get this error when you want to switch back to a
branch where this directory is still filled with the original files?

Then this is a known shortcoming of submodules at the moment. I have
experimental code to make Git work in that case but it is not ready
for inclusion yet.
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