BuildKit Dockerfile frontend

Official Dockerfile frontend that enables building Dockerfiles with BuildKit.

---

• Note for Docker users
• Using external Dockerfile frontend
• Build
• Examples
• Syntax
  • Build Mounts RUN --mount=...
    • RUN --mount=type=bind (the default mount type)
    • RUN --mount=type=cache
      • Example: cache Go packages
      • Example: cache apt packages
    • RUN --mount=type=tmpfs
    • RUN --mount=type=secret
      • Example: access to S3
    • RUN --mount=type=ssh
      • Example: access to Gitlab
    • RUN --network=none|host|default (network modes)
      • Example: isolating external effects
    • RUN --security=insecure|sandbox (security context)
      • Example: check entitlements
  • Here-Documents
  • Built-in build args
• Contributing

Note for Docker users

If you are using Docker v18.09 or later, BuildKit mode can be enabled by setting export DOCKER_BUILDKIT=1 on the client side.

Docker Buildx always enables BuildKit.

Using external Dockerfile frontend

BuildKit supports loading frontends dynamically from container images. Images for Dockerfile frontends are available at docker/dockerfile repository.

To use the external frontend, the first line of your Dockerfile needs to be # syntax=docker/dockerfile:1.3 pointing to the specific image you want to use.

BuildKit also ships with Dockerfile frontend builtin but it is recommended to use an external image to make sure that all users use the same version on the builder and to pick up bugfixes automatically without waiting for a new version of BuildKit or Docker engine.

The images are published on two channels: latest and labs. The latest channel uses semver versioning while labs uses an incrementing number. This means the labs channel may remove a feature without incrementing the major component of a version and you may want to pin the image to a specific revision. Even when syntaxes change in between releases on labs channel, the old versions are guaranteed to be backward compatible.

Build

docker/dockerfile is developed using Docker.

# build mainline channel image (output to docker)
make image

# build mainline channel image (output to docker)
CHANNEL=labs make image

# vendor
make vendor

# validate
make validate

# check dependencies updates
make mod-outdated

# build and push multi-platform mainline channel image to username/dockerfile:test
docker buildx bake image-cross --push --set *.tags=username/dockerfile:test

Examples

CLI examples

• build-using-dockerfile: a BuildKit client with docker build-style CLI

LLB examples

• dockerfile2llb: convert a Dockerfile to LLB for debugging purposes

Syntax

Build Mounts RUN --mount=...

To use this flag set Dockerfile version to at least 1.2

# syntax=docker/dockerfile:1.3

RUN --mount allows you to create mounts that process running as part of the build can access. This can be used to bind files from other part of the build without copying, accessing build secrets or ssh-agent sockets, or creating cache locations to speed up your build.

RUN --mount=type=bind (the default mount type)

This mount type allows binding directories (read-only) in the context or in an image to the build container.

Option	Description
target (required)	Mount path.
source	Source path in the from. Defaults to the root of the from.
from	Build stage or image name for the root of the source. Defaults to the build context.
rw,readwrite	Allow writes on the mount. Written data will be discarded.

RUN --mount=type=cache

This mount type allows the build container to cache directories for compilers and package managers.

Option	Description
id	Optional ID to identify separate/different caches. Defaults to value of target.
target (required)	Mount path.
ro,readonly	Read-only if set.
sharing	One of shared, private, or locked. Defaults to shared. A shared cache mount can be used concurrently by multiple writers. private creates a new mount if there are multiple writers. locked pauses the second writer until the first one releases the mount.
from	Build stage to use as a base of the cache mount. Defaults to empty directory.
source	Subpath in the from to mount. Defaults to the root of the from.
mode	File mode for new cache directory in octal. Default 0755.
uid	User ID for new cache directory. Default 0.
gid	Group ID for new cache directory. Default 0.

Contents of the cache directories persists between builder invocations without invalidating the instruction cache. Cache mounts should only be used for better performance. Your build should work with any contents of the cache directory as another build may overwrite the files or GC may clean it if more storage space is needed.

Example: cache Go packages

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3
FROM golang
...
RUN --mount=type=cache,target=/root/.cache/go-build go build ...

Example: cache apt packages

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3
FROM ubuntu
RUN rm -f /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/docker-clean; echo 'Binary::apt::APT::Keep-Downloaded-Packages "true";' > /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/keep-cache
RUN --mount=type=cache,target=/var/cache/apt --mount=type=cache,target=/var/lib/apt \
  apt update && apt-get --no-install-recommends install -y gcc

RUN --mount=type=tmpfs

This mount type allows mounting tmpfs in the build container.

Option	Description
target (required)	Mount path.
size	Specify an upper limit on the size of the filesystem.

RUN --mount=type=secret

This mount type allows the build container to access secure files such as private keys without baking them into the image.

Option	Description
id	ID of the secret. Defaults to basename of the target path.
target	Mount path. Defaults to /run/secrets/ + id.
required	If set to true, the instruction errors out when the secret is unavailable. Defaults to false.
mode	File mode for secret file in octal. Default 0400.
uid	User ID for secret file. Default 0.
gid	Group ID for secret file. Default 0.

Example: access to S3

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3
FROM python:3
RUN pip install awscli
RUN --mount=type=secret,id=aws,target=/root/.aws/credentials aws s3 cp s3://... ...

$ docker build --secret id=aws,src=$HOME/.aws/credentials .

$ buildctl build --frontend=dockerfile.v0 --local context=. --local dockerfile=. \
  --secret id=aws,src=$HOME/.aws/credentials

RUN --mount=type=ssh

This mount type allows the build container to access SSH keys via SSH agents, with support for passphrases.

Option	Description
id	ID of SSH agent socket or key. Defaults to "default".
target	SSH agent socket path. Defaults to /run/buildkit/ssh_agent.${N}.
required	If set to true, the instruction errors out when the key is unavailable. Defaults to false.
mode	File mode for socket in octal. Default 0600.
uid	User ID for socket. Default 0.
gid	Group ID for socket. Default 0.

Example: access to Gitlab

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3
FROM alpine
RUN apk add --no-cache openssh-client
RUN mkdir -p -m 0700 ~/.ssh && ssh-keyscan gitlab.com >> ~/.ssh/known_hosts
RUN --mount=type=ssh ssh -q -T git@gitlab.com 2>&1 | tee /hello
# "Welcome to GitLab, @GITLAB_USERNAME_ASSOCIATED_WITH_SSHKEY" should be printed here
# with the type of build progress is defined as `plain`.

$ eval $(ssh-agent)
$ ssh-add ~/.ssh/id_rsa
(Input your passphrase here)
$ docker build --ssh default=$SSH_AUTH_SOCK .

$ buildctl build --frontend=dockerfile.v0 --local context=. --local dockerfile=. \
  --ssh default=$SSH_AUTH_SOCK

You can also specify a path to *.pem file on the host directly instead of $SSH_AUTH_SOCK. However, pem files with passphrases are not supported.

RUN --network=none|host|default (network modes)

# syntax=docker/dockerfile:1.3

RUN --network allows control over which networking environment the command is run in.

The allowed values are:

• none - The command is run with no network access (lo is still available, but is isolated to this process)
• host - The command is run in the host's network environment (similar to docker build --network=host, but on a per-instruction basis)
• default - Equivalent to not supplying a flag at all, the command is run in the default network for the build

The use of --network=host is protected by the network.host entitlement, which needs to be enabled when starting the buildkitd daemon (--allow-insecure-entitlement network.host) and on the build request (--allow network.host).

Example: isolating external effects

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3
FROM python:3.6
ADD mypackage.tgz wheels/
RUN --network=none pip install --find-links wheels mypackage

pip will only be able to install the packages provided in the tarfile, which can be controlled by an earlier build stage.

RUN --security=insecure|sandbox (security context)

To use this flag, set Dockerfile version to labs channel.

# syntax=docker/dockerfile:1.3-labs

With --security=insecure, builder runs the command without sandbox in insecure mode, which allows to run flows requiring elevated privileges (e.g. containerd). This is equivalent to running docker run --privileged. In order to access this feature, entitlement security.insecure should be enabled when starting the buildkitd daemon (--allow-insecure-entitlement security.insecure) and for a build request (--allow security.insecure).

Default sandbox mode can be activated via --security=sandbox, but that is no-op.

Example: check entitlements

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3-labs
FROM ubuntu
RUN --security=insecure cat /proc/self/status | grep CapEff

#84 0.093 CapEff:	0000003fffffffff

Here-Documents

To use this flag, set Dockerfile version to labs channel. This feature is available since docker/dockerfile:1.3.0-labs release.

# syntax=docker/dockerfile:1.3-labs

Here-documents allow redirection of subsequent Dockerfile lines to the input of RUN or COPY commands. If such command contains a here-document Dockerfile will consider the next lines until the line only containing a here-doc delimiter as part of the same command.

Example: running a multi-line script

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3-labs
FROM debian
RUN <<eot bash
  apt-get update
  apt-get install -y vim
eot

If the command only contains a here-document, its contents is evaluated with the default shell.

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3-labs
FROM debian
RUN <<eot
  mkdir -p foo/bar
eot

Alternatively, shebang header can be used to define an interpreter.

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3-labs
FROM python:3.6
RUN <<eot
#!/usr/bin/env python
print("hello world")
eot

More complex examples may use multiple here-documents.

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3-labs
FROM alpine
RUN <<FILE1 cat > file1 && <<FILE2 cat > file2
I am
first
FILE1
I am
second
FILE2

Example: creating inline files

In COPY commands source parameters can be replaced with here-doc indicators. Regular here-doc variable expansion and tab stripping rules apply.

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3-labs
FROM alpine
ARG FOO=bar
COPY <<-eot /app/foo
	hello ${FOO}
eot

# syntax = docker/dockerfile:1.3-labs
FROM alpine
COPY <<-"eot" /app/script.sh
	echo hello ${FOO}
eot
RUN FOO=abc ash /app/script.sh

Built-in build args

• BUILDKIT_CACHE_MOUNT_NS=<string> set optional cache ID namespace
• BUILDKIT_CONTEXT_KEEP_GIT_DIR=<bool> trigger git context to keep the .git directory
• BUILDKIT_INLINE_CACHE=<bool> inline cache metadata to image configuration or not (for Docker-integrated BuildKit (DOCKER_BUILDKIT=1 docker build) and docker buildx)
• BUILDKIT_MULTI_PLATFORM=<bool> opt into determnistic output regardless of multi-platform output or not
• BUILDKIT_SANDBOX_HOSTNAME=<string> set the hostname (default buildkitsandbox)
• BUILDKIT_SYNTAX=<image> set frontend image

Contributing

Want to contribute? Awesome! You can find information about contributing to this project in the CONTRIBUTING.md