git push recurse-submodules does not work

Question

I just start to use git submodule, but the behavior is not as expected when push submodules recursively.

My git version is 2.26.2.dirty. My repo is simple, where root-project has one submodule 'common_misc'. I do some change in common_misc, add and commit it. Then go to parent directory and add/commit directory common_misc.

After all that, I run in parent directory:

git push --recurse-submodules=on-demand

it will report error:

% git push --recurse-submodules=on-demand

Pushing submodule 'common_misc' Everything up-to-date The following submodule paths contain changes that can not be found on any remote: common_misc

Please try

git push --recurse-submodules=on-demand

or cd to the path and use

git push

to push them to a remote.

fatal: Aborting.

Here is output of git status in parent and sub directories:

% git status .

On branch master Your branch is ahead of 'origin/master' by 1 commit. (use "git push" to publish your local commits)

nothing to commit, working tree clean

% cd common_misc

% git status .

On branch dev/test Your branch is ahead of 'origin/dev/test' by 1 commit. (use "git push" to publish your local commits)

nothing to commit, working tree clean

It shows both need be pushed.

I try to push without recursive in both parent and sub directories and that works without any problem.

Answer 1

I finally found what's going wrong.

The reason is, I am using 'master' branch in root project, but using 'dev/test' branch in submodule. When I run

git push --recurse-submodules=on-demand

in root directory. It will push master branch in both root and submodule directories, although I set dev/test in .gitsubmodules. Having said that, when I cd submodule directory and run 'git push', it will simply push current branch (aka dev/test branch) to the remote repo.

I don't know whether this is a bug or feature. I'd like to see git team to improve it.

I don't see other thread encountering same issue as mine, so, just keep here as a record.