Skip to Content

Hadolint: Linting your Dockerfile

Posted on 7 mins read

Linters are commonly used in development to help teams detect programmatic and stylistic errors. Hadolint is a linter created for Dockerfiles using Haskell. This tool validates against the best practices outlined by Docker and takes a neat approach to parse the Dockerfile that you should checkout. It supports all major platforms, and this tutorial will be leveraging the container to perform the linting on an example Dockerfile. Let’s get started.

The Dockerfile

$ touch Dockerfile

Now let’s add the following to the file:

FROM crystallang/crystal:latest

# Getting Depedencies
RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y \
  git \
  libc6-dev \
  libevent-dev \
  libpcre2-dev \
  libpng-dev \
  libssl-dev \
  libyaml-dev \
  zlib1g-dev \
  curl \
  wget

RUN curl -sS https://dl.yarnpkg.com/debian/pubkey.gpg | apt-key add -
RUN echo "deb https://dl.yarnpkg.com/debian/ stable main" | tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/yarn.list
RUN curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_10.x | bash -

RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y \
  yarn \
  tmux \

RUN set -ex \
        && wget -q https://github.com/DarthSim/overmind/releases/download/v2.0.0/overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && gunzip overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && chmod +x overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 \
        && mv overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 /usr/local/bin/overmind

# Cloning the Lucky repo and building Lucky
RUN set -ex \
        && git clone https://github.com/luckyframework/lucky_cli \
        && cd lucky_cli \
        && git checkout v0.12.0 \
        && shards install \
        && crystal build src/lucky.cr --release --no-debug \
        && mv lucky /usr/local/bin/lucky \
        && cd .. \
        && rm -r lucky_cli

Linting with hadolint

Now that we have a Dockerfile created let’s run hadolint against it using the container.

$ docker run --rm -i hadolint/hadolint < Dockerfile
/dev/stdin:1 DL3007 Using latest is prone to errors if the image will ever update. Pin the version explicitly to a release tag
/dev/stdin:4 DL3008 Pin versions in apt get install. Instead of `apt-get install <package>` use `apt-get install <package>=<version>`
/dev/stdin:4 DL3009 Delete the apt-get lists after installing something
/dev/stdin:4 DL3015 Avoid additional packages by specifying `--no-install-recommends`
/dev/stdin:6 DL4006 Set the SHELL option -o pipefail before RUN with a pipe in it. 
/dev/stdin:7 DL4006 Set the SHELL option -o pipefail before RUN with a pipe in it. 
/dev/stdin:8 DL4006 Set the SHELL option -o pipefail before RUN with a pipe in it. 
/dev/stdin:10 DL3008 Pin versions in apt get install. Instead of `apt-get install <package>` use `apt-get install <package>=<version>`
/dev/stdin:10 DL3009 Delete the apt-get lists after installing something
/dev/stdin:10 DL3015 Avoid additional packages by specifying `--no-install-recommends`
/dev/stdin:12 DL4001 Either use Wget or Curl but not both
/dev/stdin:19 DL3003 Use WORKDIR to switch to a directory

Wow, we have 12 issues in our Dockerfile that was found by hadolint. Let’s start fixing these issues. The first one to address is DL3007, which says to not use the latest tag.

Let’s set our image tag in our FROM.

FROM crystallang/crystal:0.27.2

Now we need to make sure we pin our versions and set –no-install-recommends in our apt-get install commands, which will address issues with the DL3008 and DL3015 codes.

FROM crystallang/crystal:0.27.2

# Getting Depedencies
RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends \
  git=1:2.7.4-0ubuntu1.7 \
  libc6-dev=2.23-0ubuntu10 \
  libevent-dev=2.0.21-stable-2ubuntu0.16.04.1 \
  libpcre2-dev=10.21-1 \
  libpng12-dev=1.2.54-1ubuntu1.1 \
  libssl-dev=1.0.2g-1ubuntu4.15 \
  libyaml-dev=0.1.6-3 \
  zlib1g-dev=1:1.2.8.dfsg-2ubuntu4.3 \
  curl=7.47.0-1ubuntu2.14 \
  wget=1.17.1-1ubuntu1.5 \
  && apt-get clean \
  && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*

RUN curl -sS https://dl.yarnpkg.com/debian/pubkey.gpg | apt-key add -
RUN echo "deb https://dl.yarnpkg.com/debian/ stable main" | tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/yarn.list
RUN curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_10.x | bash -

RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends\
  yarn=1.21.1-1 \
  tmux=2.1-3build1 \
  && apt-get clean \
  && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*
  
RUN set -ex \
        && wget -q https://github.com/DarthSim/overmind/releases/download/v2.0.0/overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && gunzip overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && chmod +x overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 \
        && mv overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 /usr/local/bin/overmind

# Cloning the Lucky repo and building Lucky
RUN set -ex \
        && git clone https://github.com/luckyframework/lucky_cli \
        && cd lucky_cli \
        && git checkout v0.12.0 \
        && shards install \
        && crystal build src/lucky.cr --release --no-debug \
        && mv lucky /usr/local/bin/lucky \
        && cd .. \
        && rm -r lucky_cli

Let’s run hadolint again and see what issues we have left.

docker run --rm -i hadolint/hadolint < Dockerfile
/dev/stdin:18 DL4006 Set the SHELL option -o pipefail before RUN with a pipe in it.
/dev/stdin:19 DL4006 Set the SHELL option -o pipefail before RUN with a pipe in it.
/dev/stdin:20 DL4006 Set the SHELL option -o pipefail before RUN with a pipe in it.
/dev/stdin:28 DL4001 Either use Wget or Curl but not both
/dev/stdin:35 DL3003 Use WORKDIR to switch to a directory

Let’s address DL4006 by adding the following before our RUN commands that add the yarn and node repositories.

SHELL ["/bin/bash", "-o", "pipefail", "-c"]

This change would make the file look like this:

FROM crystallang/crystal:0.27.2

# Getting Depedencies
RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends \
  git=1:2.7.4-0ubuntu1.7 \
  libc6-dev=2.23-0ubuntu10 \
  libevent-dev=2.0.21-stable-2ubuntu0.16.04.1 \
  libpcre2-dev=10.21-1 \
  libpng12-dev=1.2.54-1ubuntu1.1 \
  libssl-dev=1.0.2g-1ubuntu4.15 \
  libyaml-dev=0.1.6-3 \
  zlib1g-dev=1:1.2.8.dfsg-2ubuntu4.3 \
  curl=7.47.0-1ubuntu2.14 \
  wget=1.17.1-1ubuntu1.5 \
  && apt-get clean \
  && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*

SHELL ["/bin/bash", "-o", "pipefail", "-c"]
RUN curl -sS https://dl.yarnpkg.com/debian/pubkey.gpg | apt-key add -
RUN echo "deb https://dl.yarnpkg.com/debian/ stable main" | tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/yarn.list
RUN curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_10.x | bash -

RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends\
  yarn=1.21.1-1 \
  tmux=2.1-3build1 \
  && apt-get clean \
  && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*

RUN set -ex \
        && wget -q https://github.com/DarthSim/overmind/releases/download/v2.0.0/overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && gunzip overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && chmod +x overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 \
        && mv overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 /usr/local/bin/overmind

# Cloning the Lucky repo and building Lucky
RUN set -ex \
        && git clone https://github.com/luckyframework/lucky_cli \
        && WORKDIR lucky_cli \
        && git checkout v0.12.0 \
        && shards install \
        && crystal build src/lucky.cr --release --no-debug \
        && mv lucky /usr/local/bin/lucky \
        && WORKDIR .. \
        && rm -r lucky_cli

This change now leaves two remaining issues, DL3003 and DL4001. Let’s start with DL3003 by changing our cd commands to WORKDIR commands. This section begins on line 39, and here it is below.

# Cloning the Lucky repo and building Lucky
RUN set -ex \
        && git clone https://github.com/luckyframework/lucky_cli \
        && cd lucky_cli \
        && git checkout v0.12.0 \
        && shards install \
        && crystal build src/lucky.cr --release --no-debug \
        && mv lucky /usr/local/bin/lucky \
        && cd .. \
        && rm -r lucky_cli

We will change this section to be as below.

# Cloning the Lucky repo and building Lucky
RUN set -ex \
  && git clone https://github.com/luckyframework/lucky_cli

WORKDIR /lucky_cli

RUN set -ex \
 && git checkout v0.12.0 \
 && shards install \
 && crystal build src/lucky.cr --release --no-debug \
 && mv lucky /usr/local/bin/lucky

WORKDIR /

RUN set -ex \
  && rm -r lucky_cli

Let’s run hadolint again and see what we have left.

docker run --rm -i hadolint/hadolint < Dockerfile
/dev/stdin:29 DL4001 Either use Wget or Curl but not both

This issue is related to lines 19, 21, and 30. We use curl in 19 and 21 while we are also using wget on line 30. We are going to change line 30 to use curl. Here is the original line.

RUN set -ex \
        && wget -q https://github.com/DarthSim/overmind/releases/download/v2.0.0/overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && gunzip overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && chmod +x overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 \
        && mv overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 /usr/local/bin/overmind

Here is our line now converted to using curl.

RUN set -ex \
        && curl -OL https://github.com/DarthSim/overmind/releases/download/v2.0.0/overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && gunzip overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && chmod +x overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 \
        && mv overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 /usr/local/bin/overmind

Once again, let’s execute hadolint, and we should now have a clean run. While it passed, let’s not forget to remove it from the apt install line.

$ docker run --rm -i hadolint/hadolint < Dockerfile

Yay! We have a clean linting run. Here is what our file looks like in its entirety.

FROM crystallang/crystal:0.27.2

# Getting Depedencies
RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends \
  git=1:2.7.4-0ubuntu1.7 \
  libc6-dev=2.23-0ubuntu10 \
  libevent-dev=2.0.21-stable-2ubuntu0.16.04.1 \
  libpcre2-dev=10.21-1 \
  libpng12-dev=1.2.54-1ubuntu1.1 \
  libssl-dev=1.0.2g-1ubuntu4.15 \
  libyaml-dev=0.1.6-3 \
  zlib1g-dev=1:1.2.8.dfsg-2ubuntu4.3 \
  curl=7.47.0-1ubuntu2.14 \
  && apt-get clean \
  && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*

SHELL ["/bin/bash", "-o", "pipefail", "-c"]
RUN curl -sS https://dl.yarnpkg.com/debian/pubkey.gpg | apt-key add -
RUN echo "deb https://dl.yarnpkg.com/debian/ stable main" | tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/yarn.list
RUN curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_10.x | bash -

RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends\
  yarn=1.21.1-1 \
  tmux=2.1-3build1 \
  && apt-get clean \
  && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*

RUN set -ex \
        && curl -OL https://github.com/DarthSim/overmind/releases/download/v2.0.0/overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && gunzip overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64.gz \
        && chmod +x overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 \
        && mv overmind-v2.0.0-linux-amd64 /usr/local/bin/overmind

# Cloning the Lucky repo and building Lucky
RUN set -ex \
  && git clone https://github.com/luckyframework/lucky_cli

WORKDIR /lucky_cli

RUN set -ex \
 && git checkout v0.12.0 \
 && shards install \
 && crystal build src/lucky.cr --release --no-debug \
 && mv lucky /usr/local/bin/lucky

WORKDIR /

RUN set -ex \
  && rm -r lucky_cli

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed learning about hadolint. It is a helpful tool that you can easily incorporate into your development process and CI/CD pipelines. Linting is useful for ensuring that code quality is maintained, and your Dockerfiles can now enjoy the same treatment as any other code you write.

Thanks for reading,

Jamie

If you enjoy the content, then consider buying me a coffee.