CI-Prebuilds

Speed up GitHub Actions and Act by removing the dep-install steps from your workflows

Goals

• Speed up CI (Even more relevant at the Agentic era)
• Provide an environment similar to the default ubuntu-latest (docker compose, shell aliases, ...)
• Debugable / Fast using dind or dood
• Fast and light using the Alpine versions
• Easy to extend / Request a specific version
• Easy to revert / Small footprint in the CI workflows

Quickstart

Pull from Docker Hub (docker.io/jclaveau/<image>) — drop one into your workflow as the job container::

# Example for acceptance tests
jobs:
  e2e-front:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    container: jclaveau/ubuntu-dood-playwright-gyp:latest
    steps:
      - uses: jclaveau/ci-prebuilds/.github/actions/prepare@v0  # DOCKER_MODE/HOST_ADDRESS defaults + start-dockerd under dind
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - run: pnpm install --frozen-lockfile
      - run: docker compose up -d --wait  # no docker mcr.microsoft.com/playwright
      - run: pnpm exec playwright test    # no `playwright install --with-deps` required
  e2e-back:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    container: jclaveau/ubuntu-dood-pnpm-gyp:latest
    steps:
      - uses: jclaveau/ci-prebuilds/.github/actions/prepare@v0
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - run: pnpm install --frozen-lockfile
      - run: docker compose up -d --wait
      - run: pnpm exec vitest

Images

Images are layered — each builds on the previous — and every layer above the base ships in two flavors, -dood and -dind:

ubuntu-gha-tools            GitHub ubuntu-latest mimic (users, env, OS tools; slim — no compiler)
  └─ docker  (internal)     + Docker Engine & Compose
       ├─ dood              shares the host daemon (mounted socket)
       └─ dind              boots its own inner daemon
            then:  node ─┬─ pnpm ─────── playwright          (slim; each in both -dood and -dind)
                         └─ pnpm-gyp ─── playwright-gyp       (+ node-gyp toolchain, for native addons)

Image names follow <os>-<mode>[-<layer>][-sudoer]. Pick one of each axis:

Axis	Options	Default if unsure
OS	ubuntu · alpine	ubuntu
Mode	dood (faster) · dind (isolated)	dind
Layer	none · -node · -pnpm · -pnpm-gyp · -playwright · -playwright-gyp	your needs
Flavor	default (no runtime sudo) · -sudoer	hardened

• One exception: Playwright on Alpine is Chromium-only for now (using a --shell-only Chromium).

Image	What it adds	Docs
ubuntu-gha-tools	GitHub ubuntu-latest mimic (users, env, OS tools; no compiler)	README
ubuntu-dood / ubuntu-dind	+ Docker Engine & Compose	dood · dind
…-node	+ Node, npm (slim — no compiler)	README
…-pnpm	+ pnpm	README
…-pnpm-gyp	+ node-gyp toolchain (for native addons)	README
…-playwright	+ Playwright	README
…-playwright-gyp	+ Playwright on the -gyp base	README

(The docker layer is an internal, unpublished base — see docker/README.md.)

Tags

Every combination is published with a :latest tag plus a version-pinned tag. Examples on the current chain (Ubuntu 24.04 / Node 22.12 / pnpm 9.15 / Playwright 1.50):

Image	:latest example	Version-pinned tag example
jclaveau/ubuntu-gha-tools	:latest	:ubuntu24.04
jclaveau/ubuntu-dood · jclaveau/ubuntu-dind	:latest	:ubuntu24.04
jclaveau/ubuntu-dood-node	:latest	:ubuntu24.04-node22.12
jclaveau/ubuntu-dood-pnpm	:latest	:ubuntu24.04-node22.12-pnpm9.15
jclaveau/ubuntu-dood-playwright	:latest	:ubuntu24.04-node22.12-pnpm9.15-pw1.50
jclaveau/ubuntu-dood-playwright-gyp	:latest	:ubuntu24.04-node22.12-pnpm9.15-pw1.50-gyp

ghcr.io/jclaveau/…:sha-<commit> tags also exist but are build intermediates — the consumer contract is Docker Hub :latest and the version-pinned tags above.

Security

• Once every deps are installed you may not require sudo anymore. So sudo is disabled by default
• add -sudoer to any image to get sudo back
• For local act --bind use on untrusted code, prefer rootless docker

Gains

See The last benchmarks.

Full control usage

jobs:
  e2e-front:
    name: ${{ matrix.mode }}
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    strategy:
      fail-fast: false
      matrix:
        include: # Switch between ci environments to debug or save time
          - mode: dood
            image: jclaveau/ubuntu-dood-playwright-gyp:latest
            options: --volume /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock
          # - mode: dind
          #   image: jclaveau/ubuntu-dind-playwright-gyp:latest
          #   options: --privileged --env DOCKER_HOST=unix:///var/run/dind.sock
          # - mode: vm
          #   image: ""    # empty image → run on the host VM
          #   options: ""
    container:
      image: ${{ matrix.image }}
      options: ${{ matrix.options }}
    steps:
      - uses: jclaveau/ci-prebuilds/.github/actions/prepare@v0  # DOCKER_MODE/HOST_ADDRESS defaults + start-dockerd under dind
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4

      - if: env.DOCKER_MODE == 'vm'
        uses: actions/setup-node@v4
      - if: env.DOCKER_MODE == 'vm'
        uses: pnpm/action-setup@v4
        with:
          run_install: false

      - run: pnpm install --frozen-lockfile
      - run: docker compose up -d --wait

      - if: env.DOCKER_MODE == 'vm'
        name: Install Playwright browsers (vm)
        run: pnpm exec playwright install --with-deps

      - run: pnpm exec playwright test

See the action. Versioning:

• @v0 — moving tag, advanced manually on compatible action updates
• @v0.1.0 (immutable) or a commit SHA — full reproducibility
• @v1 will exist once the repo reaches v1

Roadmap

See open issues.

License

MIT