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

Issue

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?

Solution

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/

Answered By - mbuechmann

Answer Checked By - Pedro (PHPFixing Volunteer)