repo-nginx

This repository is created for testing how docker-compose behaves while spinning up multiple compose files in a single repository and in the different repositories

1. How to set up?

For testing compose files in multiple repositories, it will need to download another testing repository repo-httpd

mkdir -p compose-test
git clone https://github.com/oscarzhou-portainer/repo-httpd.git
git clone https://github.com/oscarzhou-portainer/repo-nginx.git

After cloning both repositories, the file structure should look like

├── repo-httpd
│   ├── docker-compose.yml
│   └── .env
└── repo-nginx
    ├── alpine
    │   ├── .env
    │   └── nginx-alpine.yml
    ├── docker-compose.yml
    └── .env

2. A glimpse of each compose and env file

File Path	Compose File & .env file
repo-httpd
repo-nginx
repo-nginx/alpine

3. Testing cases for a single repository

Let's start from multiple files in a single repository. Switching the current directory to /repo-nginx.

3.1. docker compose -f ./docker-compose.yml -f ./alpine/nginx-alpine.yml convert

Expect: Only /repo-nginx/.env file will be applied.

Result:

name: repo-nginx
services:
  nginx-alpine-container:
    container_name: container_nginx
    image: nginx/alpine:latest
    networks:
      default: null
    ports:
    - mode: ingress
      target: 80
      published: "7070"
      protocol: tcp
  nginx-container:
    container_name: container_nginx
    image: nginx:latest
    networks:
      default: null
    ports:
    - mode: ingress
      target: 80
      published: "7070"
      protocol: tcp
networks:
  default:
    name: repo-nginx_default

Both rendered configuration have the same port and contianer name as provided by /repo-nginx/.env. It's because docker-compose will pick up the .env file in the base path of the repository by default.

Both services are in the same network.

3.2. docker compose --env-file=./.env -f ./docker-compose.yml --env-file=./alpine/.env -f ./alpine/nginx-alpine.yml convert

Expect: Only /repo-nginx/alpine/.env file will be applied.

Result:

name: repo-nginx
services:
  nginx-alpine-container:
    container_name: container_nginx_alpine
    image: nginx/alpine:latest
    networks:
      default: null
    ports:
    - mode: ingress
      target: 80
      published: "7080"
      protocol: tcp
  nginx-container:
    container_name: container_nginx_alpine
    image: nginx:latest
    networks:
      default: null
    ports:
    - mode: ingress
      target: 80
      published: "7080"
      protocol: tcp
networks:
  default:
    name: repo-nginx_default

When multiple .env files are specified explicitly, only the last one will be used.

Both services are in the same network.

4. Testing cases for multiiple repositories

Let's switch the current directory to the parent directory of /repo-nginx.

4.1. docker compose -f ./repo-nginx/docker-compose.yml -f ./repo-httpd/docker-compose.yml convert

Expect: Only /repo-nginx/.env file will be applied.

Result:

name: repo-nginx
services:
  httpd-container:
    container_name: httpd-test-container
    image: httpd:latest
    networks:
      default: null
    ports:
    - mode: ingress
      target: 80
      published: "7070"
      protocol: tcp
  nginx-container:
    container_name: container_nginx
    image: nginx:latest
    networks:
      default: null
    ports:
    - mode: ingress
      target: 80
      published: "7070"
      protocol: tcp
networks:
  default:
    name: repo-nginx_default

As docker-compose will pick up the .env file in the base path of the repository by default and the first specified file will be considered as the main compose file.