Multiple docker-compose file with different context path - docker

Question

I have 2 docker-compose files that I need to run together, the locations of the files are like
/home/project1/docker-compose.yml
and
/home/project2/docker-compose.yml
so clearly both the services should have different contextpath
But when I run below docker compose command
docker-compose -f /home/project1/docker-compose.yml -f /home/project2/docker-compose.yml config
I get to see, Both the service are getting the same context path
app:
build:
context: /home/project1
dockerfile: Dockerfile
app2:
build:
context: /home/project1
dockerfile: Dockerfile
How can I resolve this issue I want both my services to have their own project path ie.
app service should have context path /home/project1
and
app2 service should have context path /home/project2

Answer 1

They way I found could run multiple services is:
1. First of all create images for all the services with the help of docker build command
ex: in my case it is a java application with maven build tool, so command I used:
mvn clean package docker:build -Denv=$ENV -DskipTests
2. After all the images built, create a common docker-compose file which will look like this
version: '3'
services:
service1:
image: <service1-image>
ports:
- "8100:8080"
environment:
- TZ=Asia/Kolkata
- MYSQL_USER=root
- MYSQL_PASSWORD=unroot
ulimits:
nproc: 65535
nofile:
soft: 65535
hard: 65535
service2:
image: <service2-image>
ports:
- "8101:8080"
environment:
- TZ=Asia/Kolkata
- MYSQL_USER=root
- MYSQL_PASSWORD=unroot
ulimits:
nproc: 65535
nofile:
soft: 65535
hard: 65535
service3:
image: <service3-image>
environment:
- TZ=Asia/Kolkata
- MYSQL_USER=root
- MYSQL_PASSWORD=unroot
ulimits:
nproc: 65535
nofile:
soft: 65535
hard: 65535
networks:
default:
external:
name: dev
The way I have mentioned mysql root, password, you can also add environment variables.
3.Then run below command to run all the services
docker-compose -f docker-compose.yml up
or run below command to run specific service
docker-compose -f docker-compose.yml up service1
This is working fine for me, this will require 1 time setup but after that it will be very easy and fast.

Answer 2

Option 1:
Use absolute paths for the contexts in both docker-compose files
Option 2:
Create a docker-compose.override.yml with the absolute paths:
version: "3"
services:
service1:
build:
context: /home/project1
service2:
build:
context: /home/project2
and include it in the docker-compose command:
docker-compose -f /home/project1/docker-compose.yml -f /home/project2/docker-compose.yml -f /home/docker-compose.override.yml config
On linux, to avoid hard-coding of the base path in the docker-compose.override.yml, you can use PWD environment variable:
services:
service1:
build:
context: ${PWD}/project1
service2:
build:
context: ${PWD}/project2

Answer 3

It seems that when using multiple docker-compose files the context is taken from the location of the first file. It is explained in detail in this issue
https://github.com/docker/compose/issues/3874