How do I create nested repositories in GitHub?

Question

I am able to create a repository via https://github.com/ (say repo) and have:

https://github.com/username/repo.git

How do I create another repository (say sub_repo) placed under repo and expectedly have:

https://github.com/username/repo/sub_repo.git

Solution 1

GitHub does not allow nested repositories (IIRC Git doesn't allow this for bare repositories).

However, you can use submodules to nest repositories on the "client side" in the working tree.

You need to clone the parent directory.

Then, add the sub-repository as a submodule:

git submodule add https://github.com/username/sub_repo.git

The sub_repo module will then be linked to the parent repo and can be found in the sub_repo directory.

Commit (.gitmodules and sub_repo), push and you're done.

Solution 2

github does not support nesting repositories. If you don't want to have absolute urls for submodules the custom is to place them next to super-repository and use "../" in urls, like here: https://github.com/losalamos/cinch-nested-example/blob/d59c26a89153148ba29d68dd5ee455a88efbc9a2/.gitmodules