Storage link is not included when doing a Git push Laravel

Question

I just have done a git push in our online repo

When I checked the online repo and checked the public folder it shows this:

while in my local repo I have this in my public folder:

My local has Storage folder from my storage link. I am guessing that this has something to do with the .gitignore inside my local public folder. It contains:

*
!.gitignore

Same goes with my storage folders. In our Online repo inside storage/app/public:

while in my local storage folder:

user_images is present in my local repo. Here is the inner .gitignore:

*
!.gitignore

and the outer .gitigore:

*
!public/
!.gitignore

I am not quite familiar with setting rules in .gitignore. I wish to make sure that whatever my local Storage and public folder has, the Online repo has as well. How should I go about in doing this?

Kindly edit my tags if it is misleading or incorrect. Thank you.

This is the content of the root .gitignore:

/node_modules
/public/hot
/public/storage
/storage/*.key
/vendor
.env
.phpunit.result.cache
Homestead.json
Homestead.yaml
npm-debug.log
yarn-error.log

I have removed /public/storage in .gitignored and tried to do a git push

Changes not staged for commit:
        modified:   .gitignore

and still, nothing is the same from my local to Online repo? Anything I might have missed?

Tried running git check-ignore -v path/to/file

In my root .gitignore:

/node_modules
/public/hot
/public/storage
/storage/*.key
/vendor
.env
.phpunit.result.cache
Homestead.json
Homestead.yaml
npm-debug.log
yarn-error.log

If I ran git check-ignore -v public/hot, it replies with .gitignore:2:/public/hot public/hot but if I ran git check-ignore -v public/storage, it doesn't respond with anything which it should because it is included in root .gitignore I come to believe that this situation made it impossible for the public/storage/user_images and storage/app/public/user_images. Any help is needed.

I may have been viewing a wrong file or path all this time. But I can confirm that @VonC method helped me do a proper exclusion in gitignore. Thanks.

EDIT:

Final gitignores so far

root .gitignore:

/node_modules
# /public/hot
# /public/storage
/storage/*.key
/vendor
.env
.phpunit.result.cache
Homestead.json
Homestead.yaml
npm-debug.log
yarn-error.log

storage\app.gitignore

# *
# !public/
!.gitignore

storage\app\public.gitignore

# *
!.gitignore

public\storage.gitignore

# *
!.gitignore

Just an additional info:

git check-ignore -v vendor gives .gitignore:5:/vendor vendor

while git check-ignore -v /vendor gives fatal: C:/Program Files/Git/vendor: 'C:/Program Files/Git/vendor' is outside repository

I'm not sure where git check-ignore -v path points to.

Hoyle

The storage folder inside your local screenshot has user uploaded images. I do not think that will be a a good data to push into repo, why is it needed? – Helsa

because in my project, if the user doesn't upload an image, that noimage.jpg will be used as default. What are your suggestions? – Hoyle

Is there a way we can include noimage.jpg as an exemption? or if not at least everything else in my local reflects exactly to the online repo? – Hoyle

What is the content of ,gitignore inside the laravel root? – Helsa

I have included the contents of root .gitignore in my post. I hope it helps. – Hoyle

you have /public/storage in .gitignore and hence the storage folder is ignored in the push :) – Helsa

Oh I see, so it goes without saying that I should also remove /storage/*.key to reflect all my local folders in storage to online storage folder? Or the /public/storage is enough to solve both public and storage folder synching? – Hoyle

I would say move the image outside storage folder and put it inside public/img folder – Helsa

wait why? That would cause all my img src path to mess up? Is there a way to exclude storage folder altogether? – Hoyle

If you really want then you can just remove the public/storage entry from gitignore and push the changes. It will automatically show you to add the storage folder it will show in red as untracked. – Helsa

I will try that as recommended, I'll also see if it includes the noimage.jpg – Hoyle

Updated result in the post – Hoyle

Now if you do git status, can you see public/storage in red ? – Helsa

Yes it says: Changes not staged for commit: modified: .gitignore – Hoyle

do git add .gitignore public/storage and git push – Helsa

after doing git push it said Everything up-to-date and when i did a git status it says Changes to be committed: modified: .gitignore in green color. – Hoyle

ohh did you do git commit after add and before push? – Helsa

Do not keep resources in storage. Add a new folder under assets which you copy on build to the public folder. – Cardiovascular

@MihirBhende I did a git add .gitignore public/storage, git commit -m "test", git push and checked online repo but it still has no public\storage\user_images and storage\app\public\user_images where am I doing it wrong? – Hoyle

Answer 1

First, for any file ignore within a folder, type:

git check-ignore -v -- path/to/file

That will display exactly which .gitignore is responsible for ignoring said file.

Second, the rule of gitignore is simple:

It is not possible to re-include a file if a parent directory of that file is excluded.

To exclude files (or all files) from a subfolder of an ignored folder f, you would do:

f/**
!f/**/
!f/a/sub/folder/someFile.txt

Meaning: you need to whitelist folders first, before being able to exclude from gitignore files.

Cannonry

I did git check-ignore -v storage/app/user_images and it responded storage/app/.gitignore:1:* storage/app/user_image so what i did is commented the # * so upon doing a check-ignore again nothing showed. proceeded in doing a: git add *, git commit -m "test", git push but still the online repo has no storage/app/user_images directory. Am I doing anything wrong here? – Hoyle

@JustinF As long as nothing shows, keep doing git check-ignore -v: you will see what rule block. Then re-read the rule I mention: any folder content ifnored is generally ignored because a parent folder was already ignored itself. – Cannonry

something weird is happening. I edited root .gitignore in my project, I have these two lines: /public/hot, /public/storage when I check-ignore public/hot is replies .gitignore:2:/public/hot public/hot but if I check-ignore public/storage it does not reply anything even though it is clearly included in the .gitignore file. Is there anything unusual happening here? – Hoyle

@JustinF Check-ignore a file: Git does not version folders. As a best practice, when ignoring folders (content), always put a trailing '/' in your .gitignore rules (for folders): /public/storage/ or /public/hot/ – Cannonry

@JustinF Also, what were the final gitignore rules you have set up? – Cannonry

@JustinF I confirm the check-ignore only takes relative paths from the root of the git repo, not absolute paths. – Cannonry

Can you explain further what it was meant by relative paths from the root? I didn't quite get it. – Hoyle

@JustinF in your case, if you cd to the root folder of your repo, the git check-ignore command would use public/storage (relative to that current folder), not /public/storage. – Cannonry

basically git check-ignore means project-name/ and not just project-name (without slash)? is this correct? – Hoyle

@JustinF means afile, or afolder/, in that (for the folder case) git check-ignore will test if files within that folder are ignored by a .gitignore rule. But in both cases, the path to a file (or the path to a folder) passed as an argument would be relative to your current folder, inside the repo. – Cannonry

Answer 2

For those who might still be searching for an answer, edit the .gitignore files in storage/app and storage/app/public folders and remove the first 2 lines from each.

Genera