[scribu]

`git subtree` seems like the perfect tool to complement `git submodule`.

Too bad it's not enabled by default: http://engineeredweb.com/blog/how-to-install-git-subtree/

[jedbrown]

Subtree only needs to be installed by the maintainer that interacts with the submodule's upstream. Everyone else just makes normal commits in the parent repo. They don't even need to know that the subtree has its own upstream (but they likely write better commit messages if they know).

[dustingetz]

parent comment is out of date; git subtree is part of git since roughly git 1.8.

[Tobu]

It's part of git/contrib. Depending on the packaging you still need to enable it manually.