diff --git a/poky/meta/classes/externalsrc.bbclass b/poky/meta/classes/externalsrc.bbclass
index 0deb5db..26c5803 100644
--- a/poky/meta/classes/externalsrc.bbclass
+++ b/poky/meta/classes/externalsrc.bbclass
@@ -230,7 +230,7 @@
             env['GIT_INDEX_FILE'] = tmp_index.name
             subprocess.check_output(['git', 'add', '-A', '.'], cwd=s_dir, env=env)
             git_sha1 = subprocess.check_output(['git', 'write-tree'], cwd=s_dir, env=env).decode("utf-8")
-            if os.path.exists(os.path.join(s_dir, ".gitmodules")):
+            if os.path.exists(os.path.join(s_dir, ".gitmodules")) and os.path.getsize(os.path.join(s_dir, ".gitmodules")) > 0:
                 submodule_helper = subprocess.check_output(["git", "config", "--file", ".gitmodules", "--get-regexp", "path"], cwd=s_dir, env=env).decode("utf-8")
                 for line in submodule_helper.splitlines():
                     module_dir = os.path.join(s_dir, line.rsplit(maxsplit=1)[1])