Build artefact: Docker images

[stephengaito]

Should we build Docker images?

[stephengaito]

@mpope9 has kindly provided a pull request (pdf2htmlEX/pdf2htmlEX#39) to provide the project with a working docker file.

A question is "Should we regularly build docker images for release?"

An alternate question is "Does the docker file provide a tool that end users can use to build their own docker images?"

A another question is "If we built docker images how do we see end users using these docker images?"

[Rockstar04]

Docker should not need a special "build", but once we have a stable build for ubuntu, we can package it with an ubuntu docker image. Like most of the other build/release issues, this could most likely be automated when a new tag it pushed with TravisCI #4

[stephengaito]

I think docker images are better suited to users who have a cloud based tool chain.... with various backend docker instances which pass pdfs between them for some purpose (one of which is to create an html website corresponding to the pdf using pdf2htmlEX).

SO I guess an important question is "How many users use pdf2htmlEX in a cloud?"

[mpope9]

I don't think that's necessarily true. In the docs that were forked from the original repo, they recommend docker as the easiest method. Kinda the only reason I realized there was a docker option, because the base docker files were provided on the docker hubs linked.

It may not be the 'best' way of doing it, but it is the most self contained beyond providing a flatpack.

[stephengaito]

@mpope9 thank you for this (I had not looked carefully enough at the existing wiki :$ )

I was going to ask for enough detail/documentation to write a shell script to automate the running of pdf2htmlEX inside the docker instance... but I now see everything I was about to ask for in the wiki page....

Now I will ask for one more thing... can we (collectively?) sketch (and provide URL's explaining) the steps (command lines to type) which TravisCI might take to build and upload/release a new docker image?

If we can do this I will then actually test and implement everything into a number of shell scripts for end-users and TravisCI...

(while I am "at work" next week.... I am on a walking holiday the week after).

[mpope9]

Here is their recommended steps: https://docs.travis-ci.com/user/docker/ looks pretty simple. I have never used TravisCI, but it looks like it could take 10 or 20 minutes to setup if there was an official pdf2html docker hub.

[mpope9]

Also on that wiki, it lists several package maintainers for various distros. Think it'd be worth shooting them emails and seeing if they're willing to update the packages once again?

[mpope9]

I'm willing to setup travis and the docker hub. Can also maintain it and edit the wikis if y'all are willing to ping me on lib changes, etc.

[mpope9]

I find them useful outside of the cloud, so I don't need to pollute my local Debian.

[stephengaito]

@mpope9 This would be very welcome!

As I prepare to work on the details of the fontforge problems, I have now refactored my build tools (in this project) to keep the dependent library and source versions separate from the Ansible playbooks I use to bring a new virtual machine into a state in which I can develop or test with.

As (essentially) per your request above you can now find an explicit list of all of the dependent libraries (together with their versions) listed in the Ansible Vars files (YAML) located in the building/configVars directory. Each Ansible var file corresponds to a particular OS. This provides a detailed record of what versions are being used on each OS. (Hopefully this will help anyone else who wants to work on this project understand what the dependencies are).

As I work through the fontforge issues I will be adding a new vars file for each OS release.

As I complete each OS I will ping you that I am done.

It would great to see your travis and docker work incorporated into this build repository and/or the pdf2htmlEX repository as and when you develop it.