How to use this image

All examples in this guide use the public image. If you've mirrored the repository for your own use (for example, to your Docker Hub namespace), update your commands to reference the mirrored image instead of the public one.

For example:

• Public image: dhi.io/gitlab-sidekiq:<tag>
• Mirrored image: <your-namespace>/dhi-gitlab-sidekiq:<tag>

For the examples, you must first use docker login dhi.io to authenticate to the registry to pull the images.

Start a GitLab Sidekiq instance

GitLab Sidekiq is the background job processor component of Cloud Native GitLab (CNG). It runs the full GitLab Rails application and requires external PostgreSQL, Redis, and Gitaly services. It is not a standalone service: for a complete GitLab deployment, use the GitLab Helm chart or Docker Compose with all required services.

Check the version

$ docker run --rm dhi.io/gitlab-sidekiq:<tag> cat /srv/gitlab/VERSION

With Docker Compose

A complete CNG deployment requires multiple services. See the Cloud Native GitLab documentation⁠ for Helm chart deployment, or the CNG Docker Compose⁠ for a development setup.

Logging behavior

Upstream gitlab-sidekiq defaults to USE_GITLAB_LOGGER=1, which forwards logs through the gitlab-logger binary shipped by the gitlab-base image. Docker Hardened Images do not ship that binary, so this image defaults to USE_GITLAB_LOGGER=0, which tails the log files under /var/log/gitlab with xtail instead. Application logs are unaffected; only the log-forwarding mechanism differs. Do not set USE_GITLAB_LOGGER=1 on this image unless you provide your own gitlab-logger binary.

Alpine has no xtail package, so on the Alpine variants process-wrapper falls back to tail -f over the files present at start; log files a job creates later are not picked up by the container's stdout.

Non-hardened images vs. Docker Hardened Images

The Docker Hardened GitLab Sidekiq image is a drop-in replacement for the upstream registry.gitlab.com/gitlab-org/build/cng/gitlab-sidekiq-ce image. It ships the same Rails tree under /srv/gitlab, the full upstream /scripts set (including wait-for-deps and db-migrate, which the GitLab Helm chart runs from this image), and accepts the same CONFIG_TEMPLATE_DIRECTORY / CONFIG_DIRECTORY configuration. The notable differences are:

• Two OS bases are published, Debian 13 and Alpine 3.24; upstream is Debian only.
• No tini. The entry point renders the configuration and executes the command directly, so USE_TINI has no effect. process-wrapper still execs sidekiq-cluster, which becomes PID 1. Use docker run --init if you need an init process outside Kubernetes.
• No gitlab-logger; see Logging behavior⁠.
• No gomplate, so set-config renders only .erb templates; .tpl templates in CONFIG_TEMPLATE_DIRECTORY are skipped.
• Not shipped: gm (GraphicsMagick). Jobs that shell out to it fail in this image.
• No precompiled bootsnap cache. Upstream ships one; here bootsnap writes its cache to /srv/gitlab/bootsnap on first boot, so the first start of a fresh container takes longer. Mount a volume there to keep it across restarts.
• The Rails tree is root-owned. The paths the workers write are owned by the git user (UID 1000): config/, tmp/, bootsnap/, builds/, public/uploads/, shared/artifacts/, shared/pages/ under /srv/gitlab, plus /var/opt/gitlab, /var/log/gitlab and /home/git.
• The runtime image has no package manager. Besides bash, coreutils, findutils, grep, sed and awk it carries what the workers shell out to: git, openssh-client, psql, exiftool, perl, procps, gzip and (Debian only) xtail. For anything else, use Docker Debug⁠ or the dev variant.

Image variants

Docker Hardened Images come in different variants depending on their intended use. Image variants are identified by their tag.

• Runtime variants are designed to run your application in production. These images are intended to be used either directly or as the FROM image in the final stage of a multi-stage build. These images typically:

  • Run as a nonroot user
  • Do not include a package manager. This image ships bash because its entry point requires one, see No shell⁠
  • Contain only the minimal set of libraries needed to run the app

• FIPS variants include fips in the variant name and tag. They come in both runtime and build-time variants. These variants use cryptographic modules that have been validated under FIPS 140, a U.S. government standard for secure cryptographic operations. For example, usage of MD5 fails in FIPS variants.

• Build-time variants typically include dev in the tag name and are intended for use in the first stage of a multi-stage Dockerfile. These images typically:

  • Run as the root user
  • Include a shell and package manager
  • Are used to build or compile applications

To view the image variants and get more information about them, select the Tags tab for this repository, and then select a tag.

Migrate to a Docker Hardened Image

To migrate your application to a Docker Hardened Image, you must update your Dockerfile. At minimum, you must update the base image in your existing Dockerfile to a Docker Hardened Image. This and a few other common changes are listed in the following table of migration notes.

The following steps outline the general migration process.

1. Find hardened images for your app.

   A hardened image may have several variants. Inspect the image tags and find the image variant that meets your needs.

2. Update the base image in your Dockerfile.

   Update the base image in your application's Dockerfile to the hardened image you found in the previous step. For framework images, this is typically going to be an image tagged as dev because it has the tools needed to install packages and dependencies.

3. For multi-stage Dockerfiles, update the runtime image in your Dockerfile.

   To ensure that your final image is as minimal as possible, you should use a multi-stage build. All stages in your Dockerfile should use a hardened image. While intermediary stages will typically use images tagged as dev, your final runtime stage should use a non-dev image variant.

4. Install additional packages

   Docker Hardened Images contain minimal packages in order to reduce the potential attack surface. You may need to install additional packages in your Dockerfile. Inspect the image variants to identify which packages are already installed.

   Only images tagged as dev typically have package managers. You should use a multi-stage Dockerfile to install the packages. Install the packages in the build stage that uses a dev image. Then, if needed, copy any necessary artifacts to the runtime stage that uses a non-dev image.

   For Alpine-based images, you can use apk to install packages. For Debian-based images, you can use apt-get to install packages.

Troubleshooting migration

The following are common issues that you may encounter during migration.

General debugging

The hardened images intended for runtime don't contain tools for debugging. This image ships bash for its entry point, but nothing else useful for debugging is present. The recommended method for debugging applications built with Docker Hardened Images is to use Docker Debug⁠ to attach to these containers. Docker Debug provides a shell, common debugging tools, and lets you install other tools in an ephemeral, writable layer that only exists during the debugging session.

Permissions

By default image variants intended for runtime, run as the git user. Ensure that necessary files and directories are accessible to that user. You may need to copy files to different directories or change permissions so your application running as a nonroot user can access them.

Privileged ports

Non-dev hardened images run as a nonroot user by default. As a result, applications in these images can't bind to privileged ports (below 1024) when running in Kubernetes or in Docker Engine versions older than 20.10. To avoid issues, configure your application to listen on port 1025 or higher inside the container, even if you map it to a lower port on the host. For example, docker run -p 80:8080 my-image will work because the port inside the container is 8080, and docker run -p 80:81 my-image won't work because the port inside the container is 81.

No shell

By default, image variants intended for runtime don't contain a shell. Use dev images in build stages to run shell commands and then copy any necessary artifacts into the runtime stage. In addition, use Docker Debug to debug containers with no shell.

This image is an exception: the runtime variants include bash, because the entry point and sidekiq-cluster wrapper under /scripts are shell scripts. Other debugging tools are still absent, so use Docker Debug as described above.

Entry point

Docker Hardened Images may have different entry points than images such as Docker Official Images. Use docker inspect to inspect entry points for Docker Hardened Images and update your Dockerfile if necessary.