Partials do not update when content is in a symlink

[adamfortuna]

If you render a partial, and that partial exists in a symlink, it will work and render correctly. However, if you edit the content of that partial and reload the page, it will not use the updated partial. I have a feeling it has to do with having some internal cache based on the files modified date, and its not picking up changes within a symlink.

I've tried adding the symlinked folder to reload paths (both relative, and the original folder) but looks like it's not reloading in those cases. Here's the steps to reproduce:

If you have a folder outside of your middleman project called "/users/me/code/my_folder" and symlink that into your Middleman "source/symlinked_in_folder" folder and try to use a partial within that folder you'll see this behavior.

= partial 'symlinked_in_folder/example'

Just ran into this, and am still tracking it down. If I do, I'll try adding a PR with it. :)

[adamfortuna]

Narrowed this down to v3.4 Listen.to not working as you'd expect ( issue here in the listen gem ) guard/listen#279 .

https://github.com/middleman/middleman/blob/v3.4.0/middleman-core/lib/middleman-core/preview_server.rb#L174

A workaround for the moment is to use the force_polling option, which does cause these to update:

middleman server --reload-paths data/,lib/ --force_polling true

Going to also try updating to 4's rc to see if that helps out as a next step.

[jimothyGator]

I've found that Middleman 4's multiple source folders has eliminated my need for symlinks. There's not a lot of documentation for it at present, but you can find some examples in the test fixtures, such as multiple-sources-app and multiple-sources-with-duplicate-file-names-app. Check out config.rb in both directories.

Also possibly useful, though I haven't yet used this myself, are the import_path and import_file methods. Example

[sandstrom]

I'm doing some issue-gardening 🌿🌷🌾 and came across this issue.

Sorry that this has lingered for quite a while! This should work in v4. If not a a PR with a failing test would be a great start.

Also, @jimothyGator if you'd like to provide a PR to the docs (https://github.com/middleman/middleman-guides) that would be awesome! ⛵️