How to force Docker for a clean build of an image

Question

I have build a Docker image from a Docker file using the below command.

$ docker build -t u12_core -f u12_core .

When I am trying to rebuild it

Answer 1

The command docker build --no-cache . solved our similar problem.

Our Dockerfile was:

RUN apt-get update
RUN apt-get -y install php5-fpm

But should have been:

RUN apt-get update && apt-get -y install php5-fpm

To prevent caching the update and install separately.

See: Best practices for writing Dockerfiles

Answer 2

In some extreme cases, your only way around recurring build failures is by running:

docker system prune

The command will ask you for your confirmation:

WARNING! This will remove:
    - all stopped containers
    - all volumes not used by at least one container
    - all networks not used by at least one container
    - all images without at least one container associated to them
Are you sure you want to continue? [y/N]

This is of course not a direct answer to the question, but might save some lives... It did save mine.

Answer 3

To ensure that your build is completely rebuild, including checking the base image for updates, use the following options when building:

--no-cache - This will force rebuilding of layers already available

--pull - This will trigger a pull of the base image referenced using FROM ensuring you got the latest version.

The full command will therefore look like this:

docker build --pull --no-cache --tag myimage:version .

Same options are available for docker-compose:

docker-compose build --no-cache --pull

Note that if your docker-compose file references an image, the --pull option will not actually pull the image if there is one already.

To force docker-compose to re-pull this, you can run:

docker-compose pull