Exclusion rules break if config is in parent directory

[abhinav]

Welcome

• Yes, I'm using a binary release within 2 latest releases. Only such installations are supported.
• Yes, I've searched similar issues on GitHub and didn't find any.
• Yes, I've read the typecheck section of the FAQ.
• Yes, I've tried with the standalone linter if available (e.g., gocritic, go vet, etc.).
• I agree to follow this project's Code of Conduct

How did you install golangci-lint?

I don't know

Description of the problem

With v2, if a rule in linters.exclusions.rules contains source: ... matches, and the tool is invoked from a subdirectory (instead of the directory where the .golangci.yml resides), the exclusions are ignored and a warning similar to the following is printed:

WARN [runner/exclusion_rules] Failed to get line bar/bar.go:11 from line cache: failed to get file bar/bar.go lines cache: can't get file bar/bar.go bytes from cache: can't read file bar/bar.go: open bar/bar.go: no such file or directory

Version of golangci-lint

$ golangci-lint --version
golangci-lint has version 2.0.1 built with go1.24.1 from e8927ce2 on 2025-03-24T20:34:31Z

Configuration

version: "2"

linters:
  exclusions:
    rules:
      - linters: [errcheck]
        text: Error return value of `[^`]+.Close` is not checked
        source: ^\s*defer\s

Go environment

$ go version && go env
go version go1.24.1 darwin/arm64
AR='ar'
CC='clang'
CGO_CFLAGS='-O2 -g'
CGO_CPPFLAGS=''
CGO_CXXFLAGS='-O2 -g'
CGO_ENABLED='1'
CGO_FFLAGS='-O2 -g'
CGO_LDFLAGS='-O2 -g'
CXX='clang++'
GCCGO='gccgo'
GO111MODULE=''
GOARCH='arm64'
GOARM64='v8.0'
GOAUTH='netrc'
GOBIN=''
GOCACHE='/Users/abhinav/Library/Caches/go-build'
GOCACHEPROG=''
GODEBUG=''
GOENV='/Users/abhinav/Library/Application Support/go/env'
GOEXE=''
GOEXPERIMENT=''
GOFIPS140='off'
GOFLAGS=''
GOGCCFLAGS='-fPIC -arch arm64 -pthread -fno-caret-diagnostics -Qunused-arguments -fmessage-length=0 -ffile-prefix-map=/var/folders/pd/cc8pg8hn42vg9dz7r_84t_rm0000gn/T/go-build1105924328=/tmp/go-build -gno-record-gcc-switches -fno-common'
GOHOSTARCH='arm64'
GOHOSTOS='darwin'
GOINSECURE=''
GOMOD='/Users/abhinav/src/exp/golangci-lint-v2-repro/go.mod'
GOMODCACHE='/Users/abhinav/go/pkg/mod'
GOOS='darwin'
GOPATH='/Users/abhinav/go'
GOPROXY='https://proxy.golang.org,direct'
GOROOT='/Users/abhinav/.local/share/mise/installs/go/1.24.1'
GOSUMDB='sum.golang.org'
GOTELEMETRY='on'
GOTELEMETRYDIR='/Users/abhinav/Library/Application Support/go/telemetry'
GOTMPDIR=''
GOTOOLCHAIN='auto'
GOTOOLDIR='/Users/abhinav/.local/share/mise/installs/go/1.24.1/pkg/tool/darwin_arm64'
GOVCS=''
GOVERSION='go1.24.1'
GOWORK=''
PKG_CONFIG='pkg-config'

Verbose output of running

$ golangci-lint cache clean
$ golangci-lint run -v
INFO golangci-lint has version 2.0.1 built with go1.24.1 from e8927ce2 on 2025-03-24T20:34:31Z
INFO [config_reader] Config search paths: [./ /Users/abhinav/src/exp/golangci-lint-v2-repro/bar /Users/abhinav/src/exp/golangci-lint-v2-repro /Users/abhinav/src/exp /Users/abhinav/src /Users/abhinav /Users /]
INFO [config_reader] Used config file ../.golangci.yml
INFO maxprocs: Leaving GOMAXPROCS=10: CPU quota undefined
INFO [goenv] Read go env for 5.933667ms: map[string]string{"GOCACHE":"/Users/abhinav/Library/Caches/go-build", "GOROOT":"/Users/abhinav/.local/share/mise/installs/go/1.24.1"}
INFO [lintersdb] Active 5 linters: [errcheck govet ineffassign staticcheck unused]
INFO [loader] Go packages loading at mode 8767 (name|types_sizes|compiled_files|exports_file|files|imports|deps) took 454.833417ms
INFO [runner/filename_unadjuster] Pre-built 0 adjustments in 900.5µs
INFO [linters_context/goanalysis] analyzers took 481.463863ms with top 10 stages: buildir: 297.471829ms, printf: 28.921206ms, ctrlflow: 27.20283ms, fact_deprecated: 26.42971ms, SA5012: 24.823462ms, fact_purity: 23.408038ms, nilness: 16.751123ms, inspect: 15.411585ms, typedness: 14.123455ms, tokenfileanalyzer: 4.07767ms
WARN [runner/exclusion_rules] Failed to get line bar/bar.go:11 from line cache: failed to get file bar/bar.go lines cache: can't get file bar/bar.go bytes from cache: can't read file bar/bar.go: open bar/bar.go: no such file or directory
INFO [runner/exclusion_rules] Skipped 0 issues by rules: [Text: "Error return value of `[^`]+.Close` is not checked", Source: "^\\s*defer\\s", Linters: "errcheck"]
INFO [runner] Processors filtering stat (in/out): diff: 1/1, path_prettifier: 1/1, filename_unadjuster: 1/1, invalid_issue: 1/1, nolint_filter: 1/1, max_per_file_from_linter: 1/1, max_from_linter: 1/1, severity-rules: 1/1, path_absoluter: 1/1, cgo: 1/1, exclusion_paths: 1/1, fixer: 1/1, max_same_issues: 1/1, source_code: 1/1, path_relativity: 1/1, generated_file_filter: 1/1, exclusion_rules: 1/1, uniq_by_line: 1/1, path_shortener: 1/1, sort_results: 1/1
INFO [runner] processing took 98.418µs with stages: nolint_filter: 24.292µs, generated_file_filter: 20.708µs, exclusion_rules: 17.792µs, cgo: 14.25µs, source_code: 13µs, sort_results: 3.25µs, path_relativity: 1.291µs, uniq_by_line: 1.167µs, max_same_issues: 500ns, path_shortener: 459ns, invalid_issue: 375ns, fixer: 292ns, filename_unadjuster: 209ns, max_from_linter: 209ns, exclusion_paths: 167ns, path_absoluter: 167ns, max_per_file_from_linter: 124ns, diff: 83ns, path_prettifier: 83ns, severity-rules: 0s
INFO [runner] linters took 404.248375ms with stages: goanalysis_metalinter: 404.117459ms
bar/bar.go:11:15: Error return value of `f.Close` is not checked (errcheck)
        defer f.Close()
                     ^
1 issues:
* errcheck: 1
INFO File cache stats: 1 entries of total size 114B
INFO Memory: 10 samples, avg is 107.4MB, max is 289.1MB
INFO Execution took 866.396291ms

A minimal reproducible example or link to a public repository

Given the following layout:

-- go.mod --
module example.com/foo

go 1.24.1

-- .golangci.yml --
version: "2"

linters:
  exclusions:
    rules:
      - linters: [errcheck]
        text: Error return value of `[^`]+.Close` is not checked
        source: ^\s*defer\s

-- foo.go --
package foo

import "os"

func Foo() {
	f, err := os.Open("foo")
	if err != nil {
		return
	}

	defer f.Close()
}

-- bar/bar.go --
package foo

import "os"

func Bar() {
	f, err := os.Open("foo")
	if err != nil {
		return
	}

	defer f.Close()
}

golangci-lint run from the root directory passes just fine, but from the bar directory fails with:

❮ golangci-lint run
WARN [runner/exclusion_rules] Failed to get line bar/bar.go:11 from line cache: failed to get file bar/bar.go lines cache: can't get file bar/bar.go bytes from cache: can't read file bar/bar.go: open bar/bar.go: no such file or directory
bar/bar.go:11:15: Error return value of `f.Close` is not checked (errcheck)
        defer f.Close()

Validation

• Yes, I've included all information above (version, config, etc.).

Supporter

• I am a sponsor/backer through GitHub or OpenCollective

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