CODEWITHSUNDEEP
dockerdocker-composeenvironment-variables
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Reputation: 153

How to use environment variables with docker-compose from other directory

I'm setting up a new docker-based server and I'm writing a script to run

$ docker-compose

for all my docker-compose.yml files at once.

I know about existence of .env files and I know about env_file option in docker-compose.yml, however the .env files are ignored when I launch

$ docker-compose up

from other directory and not even full path in env_file helps.

my_script.sh:

#!/bin/bash

docker-compose up -f /server1/docker-compose.yml -f /server2/docker-compose.yml -f /server3/docker-compose.yml

Docker-compose.yml:

version: '3'

services:
  service_name:
    build: /server1/apache
    env_file: /server1/.env
    volumes:
      - /web/${ROOT_DOMAIN}/web/:/var/www/:rw

.env

ROOT_DOMAIN=server1.domain.tld

I want to replace the ${ROOT_DOMAIN} variable in volumes for the variable defined in .env file. This works like a charm, when I run

$ docker-compose up

from the /server1/ folder. However when I run my script, which is in other directory, the enviroment variables are ignored and default to null.

How to fix this?

Upvotes: 5

Views: 9985

Answers (4)

Inspiraller
Inspiraller

Reputation: 3806

Using flag didn't work for me, but since I'm using node I created a script which copies the .env file across before running it.

If you aren't using node you could run a bash script which essentially does the same thing.

"scripts":
{
   "build_postgres":"cp .env node-app/pg/.env && cd node-app/pg && docker-compose up", 
}

Warning

Just be sure to exclude the .env file from your .gitignore in case of sensitive information ending up in git repo.

.gitignore

node-app/pg/.env

note:

Be sure your .env file variables are uppercase and values

PG_USER=myuser

Upvotes: 0

webtechnelson
webtechnelson

Reputation: 370

You can use the flag --env-file to set the path where the .env file is located, example:

docker-compose --env-file ./config/.env.dev up

Official Docker documentation: https://docs.docker.com/compose/environment-variables/

Upvotes: 3

P i
P i

Reputation: 30684

You can roll your own:

function execute() {    
    (set -a;  source .env;  cat $1 | envsubst | kubectl apply -f -)
}

execute foo.yaml

And

$ cat .env
FOO=123
BAR=abc

$ cat foo.yaml
{
    "myfoo": $FOO,
    "mybar": $BAR
}

Upvotes: 0

mbuechmann
mbuechmann

Reputation: 5750

Sorry to say, but this cannot be fixed. The provided .env file must be in the same directory.

This is a requirement of docker compose and is described in the docs (first paragraph): https://docs.docker.com/compose/env-file/

Upvotes: 8

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