•

Local directory – e.g. --build-context project2=../path/to/project2/src (This option is not available with the remote Podman client. On Podman machine setup (i.e macOS and Windows) path must exists on the machine VM)

•

HTTP URL to a tarball – e.g. --build-context src=https://example.org/releases/src.tar

•

Container image – specified with a container-image:// prefix, e.g. --build-context alpine=container-image://alpine:3.15, (also accepts docker://, docker-image://)

•

Named build context defined with --build-context [name]=..

•

Stage defined with AS [name] inside Containerfile

•

Image [name], either local or in a remote registry

On some systems, changing the resource limits may not be allowed for non-root users. For more details, see https://github.com/containers/podman/blob/main/troubleshooting.md#26-running-containers-with-resource-limits-fails-with-a-permissions-error

This option is not supported on cgroups V1 rootless systems.

--cpuset-cpus=number

CPUs in which to allow execution. Can be specified as a comma-separated list (e.g. 0,1 ), as a range (e.g. 0-3 ), or any combination thereof (e.g. 0-3,7,11-15 ).

On some systems, changing the resource limits may not be allowed for non-root users. For more details, see https://github.com/containers/podman/blob/main/troubleshooting.md#26-running-containers-with-resource-limits-fails-with-a-permissions-error

This option is not supported on cgroups V1 rootless systems.

--cpuset-mems=nodes

Memory nodes (MEMs) in which to allow execution (0-3, 0,1). Only effective on NUMA systems.

If there are four memory nodes on the system (0-3), use --cpuset-mems=0,1 then processes in the container only uses memory from the first two memory nodes.

On some systems, changing the resource limits may not be allowed for non-root users. For more details, see https://github.com/containers/podman/blob/main/troubleshooting.md#26-running-containers-with-resource-limits-fails-with-a-permissions-error

This option is not supported on cgroups V1 rootless systems.

--creds=[username[:password]]

The [username[:password]] to use to authenticate with the registry, if required. If one or both values are not supplied, a command line prompt appears and the value can be entered. The password is entered without echo.

Note that the specified credentials are only used to authenticate against target registries. They are not used for mirrors or when the registry gets rewritten (see containers-registries.conf(5) ); to authenticate against those consider using a containers-auth.json(5) file.

--decryption-key=key[:passphrase]

The [key[:passphrase]] to be used for decryption of images. Key can point to keys and/or certificates. Decryption is tried with all keys. If the key is protected by a passphrase, it is required to be passed in the argument and omitted otherwise.

--device=host-device[:container-device][:permissions]

Add a host device to the container. Optional permissions parameter can be used to specify device permissions by combining r for read, w for write, and m for mknod (2).

Example: --device=/dev/sdc:/dev/xvdc:rwm .

Note: if host-device is a symbolic link then it is resolved first. The container only stores the major and minor numbers of the host device.

Podman may load kernel modules required for using the specified device. The devices that Podman loads modules for when necessary are: /dev/fuse.

In rootless mode, the new device is bind mounted in the container from the host rather than Podman creating it within the container space. Because the bind mount retains its SELinux label on SELinux systems, the container can get permission denied when accessing the mounted device. Modify SELinux settings to allow containers to use all device labels via the following command:

$ sudo setsebool -P container_use_devices=true

Note: if the user only has access rights via a group, accessing the device from inside a rootless container fails. The crun(1) runtime offers a workaround for this by adding the option --annotation run.oci.keep_original_groups=1 .

--disable-compression, -D

Don’t compress filesystem layers when building the image unless it is required by the location where the image is being written. This is the default setting, because image layers are compressed automatically when they are pushed to registries, and images being written to local storage only need to be decompressed again to be stored. Compression can be forced in all cases by specifying --disable-compression=false .

--dns=ipaddr

Set custom DNS servers.

This option can be used to override the DNS configuration passed to the container. Typically this is necessary when the host DNS configuration is invalid for the container (e.g., 127.0.0.1 ). When this is the case the --dns flag is necessary for every run.

The special value none can be specified to disable creation of /etc/resolv.conf in the container by Podman. The /etc/resolv.conf file in the image is used without changes.

This option cannot be combined with --network that is set to none .

Note: this option takes effect only during RUN instructions in the build. It does not affect /etc/resolv.conf in the final image.

--dns-option=option

Set custom DNS options to be used during the build.

--dns-search=domain

Set custom DNS search domains to be used during the build.

--env=env[=value]

Add a value (e.g. env= value ) to the built image. Can be used multiple times. If neither = nor a value are specified, but env is set in the current environment, the value from the current environment is added to the image. To remove an environment variable from the built image, use the --unsetenv option.

--farm

This option specifies the name of the farm to be used in the build process.

This option specifies the name of the farm to be used in the build process.

--file, -f=Containerfile

Specifies a Containerfile which contains instructions for building the image, either a local file or an http or https URL. If more than one Containerfile is specified, FROM instructions are only be accepted from the last specified file.

If a build context is not specified, and at least one Containerfile is a local file, the directory in which it resides is used as the build context.

Specifying the option -f - causes the Containerfile contents to be read from stdin.

--force-rm

Always remove intermediate containers after a build, even if the build fails (default true).

--format

Control the format for the built image’s manifest and configuration data. Recognized formats include oci (OCI image-spec v1.0, the default) and docker (version 2, using schema format 2 for the manifest).

Note: You can also override the default format by setting the BUILDAH_FORMAT environment variable. export BUILDAH_FORMAT=docker

--from

Overrides the first FROM instruction within the Containerfile. If there are multiple FROM instructions in a Containerfile, only the first is changed.

With the remote podman client, not all container transports work as expected. For example, oci-archive:/x.tar references /x.tar on the remote machine instead of on the client. When using podman remote clients it is best to restrict use to containers-storage , and docker:// transports .

--group-add=group | keep-groups

Assign additional groups to the primary user running within the container process.

Allows container to use the user’s supplementary group access. If file systems or devices are only accessible by the rootless user’s group, this flag tells the OCI runtime to pass the group access into the container. Currently only available with the crun OCI runtime. Note: keep-groups is exclusive, other groups cannot be specified with this flag. (Not available for remote commands, including Mac and Windows (excluding WSL2) machines)

--help, -h

Print usage statement

--hooks-dir=path

Each *.json file in the path configures a hook for buildah build containers. For more details on the syntax of the JSON files and the semantics of hook injection. Buildah currently support both the 1.0.0 and 0.1.0 hook schemas, although the 0.1.0 schema is deprecated.

This option may be set multiple times; paths from later options have higher precedence.

For the annotation conditions, buildah uses any annotations set in the generated OCI configuration.

For the bind-mount conditions, only mounts explicitly requested by the caller via --volume are considered. Bind mounts that buildah inserts by default (e.g. /dev/shm) are not considered.

If --hooks-dir is unset for root callers, Buildah currently defaults to /usr/share/containers/oci/hooks.d and /etc/containers/oci/hooks.d in order of increasing precedence. Using these defaults is deprecated. Migrate to explicitly setting --hooks-dir.

--http-proxy

By default proxy environment variables are passed into the container if set for the Podman process. This can be disabled by setting the value to false . The environment variables passed in include http_proxy , https_proxy , ftp_proxy , no_proxy , and also the upper case versions of those. This option is only needed when the host system must use a proxy but the container does not use any proxy. Proxy environment variables specified for the container in any other way overrides the values that have been passed through from the host. (Other ways to specify the proxy for the container include passing the values with the --env flag, or hard coding the proxy environment at container build time.) When used with the remote client it uses the proxy environment variables that are set on the server process.

Defaults to true .

--identity-label

Adds default identity label io.buildah.version if set. (default true).

--ignorefile

Path to an alternative .containerignore file.

--iidfile=ImageIDfile

Write the built image’s ID to the file. When --platform is specified more than once, attempting to use this option triggers an error.

--ipc=how

Sets the configuration for IPC namespaces when handling RUN instructions. The configured value can be "" (the empty string) or "container" to indicate that a new IPC namespace is created, or it can be "host" to indicate that the IPC namespace in which podman itself is being run is reused, or it can be the path to an IPC namespace which is already in use by another process.

--isolation=type

Controls what type of isolation is used for running processes as part of RUN instructions. Recognized types include oci (OCI-compatible runtime, the default), rootless (OCI-compatible runtime invoked using a modified configuration and its --rootless option enabled, with --no-new-keyring --no-pivot added to its create invocation, with network and UTS namespaces disabled, and IPC, PID, and user namespaces enabled; the default for unprivileged users), and chroot (an internal wrapper that leans more toward chroot(1) than container technology).

Note: You can also override the default isolation type by setting the BUILDAH_ISOLATION environment variable. export BUILDAH_ISOLATION=oci

--jobs=number

Run up to N concurrent stages in parallel. If the number of jobs is greater than 1, stdin is read from /dev/null. If 0 is specified, then there is no limit in the number of jobs that run in parallel.

--label=label

Add an image label (e.g. label= value ) to the image metadata. Can be used multiple times.

Users can set a special LABEL io.containers.capabilities=CAP1,CAP2,CAP3 in a Containerfile that specifies the list of Linux capabilities required for the container to run properly. This label specified in a container image tells Podman to run the container with just these capabilities. Podman launches the container with just the specified capabilities, as long as this list of capabilities is a subset of the default list.

If the specified capabilities are not in the default set, Podman prints an error message and runs the container with the default capabilities.

--layer-label=label[=value]

Add an intermediate image label (e.g. label= value ) to the intermediate image metadata. It can be used multiple times.

If label is named, but neither = nor a value is provided, then the label is set to an empty value.

--layers

Cache intermediate images during the build process (Default is true ).

Note: You can also override the default value of layers by setting the BUILDAH_LAYERS environment variable. export BUILDAH_LAYERS=true

--local, -l

Build image on local machine as well as on farm nodes.

--logfile=filename

Log output which is sent to standard output and standard error to the specified file instead of to standard output and standard error. This option is not supported on the remote client, including Mac and Windows (excluding WSL2) machines.

--memory, -m=number[unit]

Memory limit. A unit can be b (bytes), k (kibibytes), m (mebibytes), or g (gibibytes).

Allows the memory available to a container to be constrained. If the host supports swap memory, then the -m memory setting can be larger than physical RAM. If a limit of 0 is specified (not using -m ), the container’s memory is not limited. The actual limit may be rounded up to a multiple of the operating system’s page size (the value is very large, that’s millions of trillions).

This option is not supported on cgroups V1 rootless systems.

--memory-swap=number[unit]

A limit value equal to memory plus swap. A unit can be b (bytes), k (kibibytes), m (mebibytes), or g (gibibytes).

Must be used with the -m ( --memory ) flag. The argument value must be larger than that of
-m ( --memory ) By default, it is set to double the value of --memory .

Set number to -1 to enable unlimited swap.

This option is not supported on cgroups V1 rootless systems.

--network=mode, --net

Sets the configuration for network namespaces when handling RUN instructions.

Valid mode values are:

•

pasta[:OPTIONS,...] : use pasta (1) to create a user-mode networking stack.
This is the default for rootless containers and only supported in rootless mode.
By default, IPv4 and IPv6 addresses and routes, as well as the pod interface name, are copied from the host. If port forwarding isn’t configured, ports are forwarded dynamically as services are bound on either side (init namespace or container namespace). Port forwarding preserves the original source IP address. Options described in pasta(1) can be specified as comma-separated arguments.
In terms of pasta(1) options, --config-net is given by default, in order to configure networking when the container is started, and --no-map-gw is also assumed by default, to avoid direct access from container to host using the gateway address. The latter can be overridden by passing --map-gw in the pasta-specific options (despite not being an actual pasta(1) option).
Also, -t none and -u none are passed to disable automatic port forwarding based on bound ports. Similarly, -T none and -U none are given to disable the same functionality from container to host.
Some examples:

--no-cache

Do not use existing cached images for the container build. Build from the start with a new set of cached layers.

--no-hostname

Do not create the /etc/hostname file in the containers.

By default, Podman manages the /etc/hostname file, adding the container’s own hostname. When the --no-hostname option is set, the image’s /etc/hostname will be preserved unmodified if it exists.

--no-hosts

Do not modify the /etc/hosts file in the container.

Podman assumes control over the container’s /etc/hosts file by default and adds entries for the container’s name (see --name option) and hostname (see --hostname option), the internal host.containers.internal and host.docker.internal hosts, as well as any hostname added using the --add-host option. Refer to the --add-host option for details. Passing --no-hosts disables this, so that the image’s /etc/hosts file is kept unmodified. The same can be achieved globally by setting no_hosts=true in containers.conf .

This option conflicts with --add-host .

--omit-history

Omit build history information in the built image. (default false).

This option is useful for the cases where end users explicitly want to set --omit-history to omit the optional History from built images or when working with images built using build tools that do not include History information in their images.

--os-feature=feature

Set the name of a required operating system feature for the image which is built. By default, if the image is not based on scratch , the base image’s required OS feature list is kept, if the base image specified any. This option is typically only meaningful when the image’s OS is Windows.

If feature has a trailing - , then the feature is removed from the set of required features which is listed in the image.

--os-version=version

Set the exact required operating system version for the image which is built. By default, if the image is not based on scratch , the base image’s required OS version is kept, if the base image specified one. This option is typically only meaningful when the image’s OS is Windows, and is typically set in Windows base images, so using this option is usually unnecessary.

--pid=pid

Sets the configuration for PID namespaces when handling RUN instructions. The configured value can be "" (the empty string) or "container" to indicate that a new PID namespace is created, or it can be "host" to indicate that the PID namespace in which podman itself is being run is reused, or it can be the path to a PID namespace which is already in use by another process.

--platforms=p1,p2,p3...

Build only on farm nodes that match the given platforms.

--pull=policy

Pull image policy. The default is missing .

--quiet, -q

Suppress output messages which indicate which instruction is being processed, and of progress when pulling images from a registry, and when writing the output image.

--retry=attempts

Number of times to retry pulling or pushing images between the registry and local storage in case of failure. Default is 3 .

--retry-delay=duration

Duration of delay between retry attempts when pulling or pushing images between the registry and local storage in case of failure. The default is to start at two seconds and then exponentially back off. The delay is used when this value is set, and no exponential back off occurs.

--rm

Remove intermediate containers after a successful build (default true).

--runtime=path

The path to an alternate OCI-compatible runtime, which is used to run commands specified by the RUN instruction.

Note: You can also override the default runtime by setting the BUILDAH_RUNTIME environment variable. export BUILDAH_RUNTIME=/usr/local/bin/runc

--runtime-flag=flag

Adds global flags for the container runtime. To list the supported flags, please consult the manpages of the selected container runtime.

Note: Do not pass the leading -- to the flag. To pass the runc flag --log-format json to buildah build, the option given is --runtime-flag log-format=json.

--sbom=preset

Generate SBOMs (Software Bills Of Materials) for the output image by scanning the working container and build contexts using the named combination of scanner image, scanner commands, and merge strategy. Must be specified with one or more of --sbom-image-output , --sbom-image-purl-output , --sbom-output , and --sbom-purl-output . Recognized presets, and the set of options which they equate to:

--sbom-scanner-image=ghcr.io/anchore/syft
--sbom-scanner-command="/syft scan -q dir:{ROOTFS} --output cyclonedx-json={OUTPUT}"
--sbom-scanner-command="/syft scan -q dir:{CONTEXT} --output cyclonedx-json={OUTPUT}"
--sbom-merge-strategy=merge-cyclonedx-by-component-name-and-version

--sbom-scanner-image=ghcr.io/anchore/syft
--sbom-scanner-command="/syft scan -q dir:{ROOTFS} --output spdx-json={OUTPUT}"
--sbom-scanner-command="/syft scan -q dir:{CONTEXT} --output spdx-json={OUTPUT}"
--sbom-merge-strategy=merge-spdx-by-package-name-and-versioninfo

--sbom-scanner-image=ghcr.io/aquasecurity/trivy
--sbom-scanner-command="trivy filesystem -q {ROOTFS} --format cyclonedx --output {OUTPUT}"
--sbom-scanner-command="trivy filesystem -q {CONTEXT} --format cyclonedx --output {OUTPUT}"
--sbom-merge-strategy=merge-cyclonedx-by-component-name-and-version

--sbom-scanner-image=ghcr.io/aquasecurity/trivy
--sbom-scanner-command="trivy filesystem -q {ROOTFS} --format spdx-json --output {OUTPUT}"
--sbom-scanner-command="trivy filesystem -q {CONTEXT} --format spdx-json --output {OUTPUT}"
--sbom-merge-strategy=merge-spdx-by-package-name-and-versioninfo

--sbom-image-output=path

When generating SBOMs, store the generated SBOM in the specified path in the output image. There is no default.

--sbom-image-purl-output=path

When generating SBOMs, scan them for PURL (package URL ⟨ https://github.com/package-url/purl-spec/blob/master/PURL-SPECIFICATION.rst⟩ ) information, and save a list of found PURLs to the specified path in the output image. There is no default.

--sbom-merge-strategy=method

If more than one --sbom-scanner-command value is being used, use the specified method to merge the output from later commands with output from earlier commands. Recognized values include:

Concatenate the files.

Merge the "component" fields of JSON documents, ignoring values from
documents when the combination of their "name" and "version" values is
already present. Documents are processed in the order in which they are
generated, which is the order in which the commands that generate them
were specified.

Merge the "package" fields of JSON documents, ignoring values from
documents when the combination of their "name" and "versionInfo" values is
already present. Documents are processed in the order in which they are
generated, which is the order in which the commands that generate them
were specified.

--sbom-output=file

When generating SBOMs, store the generated SBOM in the named file on the local filesystem. There is no default.

--sbom-purl-output=file

When generating SBOMs, scan them for PURL (package URL ⟨ https://github.com/package-url/purl-spec/blob/master/PURL-SPECIFICATION.rst⟩ ) information, and save a list of found PURLs to the named file in the local filesystem. There is no default.

--sbom-scanner-command=image

Generate SBOMs by running the specified command from the scanner image. If multiple commands are specified, they are run in the order in which they are specified. These text substitutions are performed:
- {ROOTFS}
The root of the built image’s filesystem, bind mounted.
- {CONTEXT}
The build context and additional build contexts, bind mounted.
- {OUTPUT}
The name of a temporary output file, to be read and merged with others or copied elsewhere.

--sbom-scanner-image=image

Generate SBOMs using the specified scanner image.

--secret=id=id[,src=envOrFile][,env=ENV][,type=file | env]

Pass secret information to be used in the Containerfile for building images in a safe way that will not end up stored in the final image, or be seen in other stages. The value of the secret will be read from an environment variable or file named by the "id" option, or named by the "src" option if it is specified, or from an environment variable specified by the "env" option. See EXAMPLES ⟨ #examples⟩ . The secret will be mounted in the container at /run/secrets/id by default.

To later use the secret, use the --mount flag in a RUN instruction within a Containerfile :

RUN --mount=type=secret,id=mysecret cat /run/secrets/mysecret

The location of the secret in the container can be overridden using the "target", "dst", or "destination" option of the RUN --mount flag.

RUN --mount=type=secret,id=mysecret,target=/run/secrets/myothersecret cat /run/secrets/myothersecret

Note: changing the contents of secret files will not trigger a rebuild of layers that use said secrets.

--security-opt=option

Security Options

--shm-size=number[unit]

Size of /dev/shm . A unit can be b (bytes), k (kibibytes), m (mebibytes), or g (gibibytes). If the unit is omitted, the system uses bytes. If the size is omitted, the default is 64m . When size is 0 , there is no limit on the amount of memory used for IPC by the container. This option conflicts with --ipc=host .

--skip-unused-stages

Skip stages in multi-stage builds which don’t affect the target stage. (Default: true ).

--squash

Squash all of the image’s new layers into a single new layer; any preexisting layers are not squashed.

--squash-all

Squash all of the new image’s layers (including those inherited from a base image) into a single new layer.

--ssh=default | id[=socket>

SSH agent socket or keys to expose to the build. The socket path can be left empty to use the value of default=$SSH_AUTH_SOCK

To later use the ssh agent, use the --mount option in a RUN instruction within a Containerfile :

RUN --mount=type=ssh,id=id mycmd

--tag, -t=imageName

Specifies the name which is assigned to the resulting image if the build process completes successfully. If imageName does not include a registry name, the registry name localhost is prepended to the image name.

--target=stageName

Set the target build stage to build. When building a Containerfile with multiple build stages, --target can be used to specify an intermediate build stage by name as the final stage for the resulting image. Commands after the target stage is skipped.

--timestamp=seconds

Set the create timestamp to seconds since epoch to allow for deterministic builds (defaults to current time). By default, the created timestamp is changed and written into the image manifest with every commit, causing the image’s sha256 hash to be different even if the sources are exactly the same otherwise. When --timestamp is set, the created timestamp is always set to the time specified and therefore not changed, allowing the image’s sha256 hash to remain the same. All files committed to the layers of the image is created with the timestamp.

If the only instruction in a Containerfile is FROM , this flag has no effect.

--tls-verify

Require HTTPS and verify certificates when contacting registries (default: true ). If explicitly set to true , TLS verification is used. If set to false , TLS verification is not used. If not specified, TLS verification is used unless the target registry is listed as an insecure registry in containers-registries.conf(5)

--ulimit=type=soft-limit[:hard-limit]

Specifies resource limits to apply to processes launched when processing RUN instructions. This option can be specified multiple times. Recognized resource types include:
"core": maximum core dump size (ulimit -c)
"cpu": maximum CPU time (ulimit -t)
"data": maximum size of a process’s data segment (ulimit -d)
"fsize": maximum size of new files (ulimit -f)
"locks": maximum number of file locks (ulimit -x)
"memlock": maximum amount of locked memory (ulimit -l)
"msgqueue": maximum amount of data in message queues (ulimit -q)
"nice": niceness adjustment (nice -n, ulimit -e)
"nofile": maximum number of open files (ulimit -n)
"nproc": maximum number of processes (ulimit -u)
"rss": maximum size of a process’s (ulimit -m)
"rtprio": maximum real-time scheduling priority (ulimit -r)
"rttime": maximum amount of real-time execution between blocking syscalls
"sigpending": maximum number of pending signals (ulimit -i)
"stack": maximum stack size (ulimit -s)

--unsetenv=env

Unset environment variables from the final image.

--unsetlabel=label

Unset the image label, causing the label not to be inherited from the base image.

--userns=how

Sets the configuration for user namespaces when handling RUN instructions. The configured value can be "" (the empty string) or "container" to indicate that a new user namespace is created, it can be "host" to indicate that the user namespace in which podman itself is being run is reused, or it can be the path to a user namespace which is already in use by another process.

--userns-gid-map=mapping

Directly specifies a GID mapping to be used to set ownership, at the filesystem level, on the working container’s contents. Commands run when handling RUN instructions defaults to being run in their own user namespaces, configured using the UID and GID maps.

Entries in this map take the form of one or more triples of a starting in-container GID, a corresponding starting host-level GID, and the number of consecutive IDs which the map entry represents.

This option overrides the remap-gids setting in the options section of /etc/containers/storage.conf.

If this option is not specified, but a global --userns-gid-map setting is supplied, settings from the global option is used.

If none of --userns-uid-map-user, --userns-gid-map-group, or --userns-gid-map are specified, but --userns-uid-map is specified, the GID map is set to use the same numeric values as the UID map.

--userns-gid-map-group=group

Specifies that a GID mapping to be used to set ownership, at the filesystem level, on the working container’s contents, can be found in entries in the /etc/subgid file which correspond to the specified group. Commands run when handling RUN instructions defaults to being run in their own user namespaces, configured using the UID and GID maps. If --userns-uid-map-user is specified, but --userns-gid-map-group is not specified, podman assumes that the specified user name is also a suitable group name to use as the default setting for this option.

NOTE: When this option is specified by a rootless user, the specified mappings are relative to the rootless user namespace in the container, rather than being relative to the host as it is when run rootful.

--userns-uid-map=mapping

Directly specifies a UID mapping to be used to set ownership, at the filesystem level, on the working container’s contents. Commands run when handling RUN instructions default to being run in their own user namespaces, configured using the UID and GID maps.

Entries in this map take the form of one or more triples of a starting in-container UID, a corresponding starting host-level UID, and the number of consecutive IDs which the map entry represents.

This option overrides the remap-uids setting in the options section of /etc/containers/storage.conf.

If this option is not specified, but a global --userns-uid-map setting is supplied, settings from the global option is used.

If none of --userns-uid-map-user, --userns-gid-map-group, or --userns-uid-map are specified, but --userns-gid-map is specified, the UID map is set to use the same numeric values as the GID map.

--userns-uid-map-user=user

Specifies that a UID mapping to be used to set ownership, at the filesystem level, on the working container’s contents, can be found in entries in the /etc/subuid file which correspond to the specified user. Commands run when handling RUN instructions defaults to being run in their own user namespaces, configured using the UID and GID maps. If --userns-gid-map-group is specified, but --userns-uid-map-user is not specified, podman assumes that the specified group name is also a suitable user name to use as the default setting for this option.

NOTE: When this option is specified by a rootless user, the specified mappings are relative to the rootless user namespace in the container, rather than being relative to the host as it is when run rootful.

--uts=how

Sets the configuration for UTS namespaces when handling RUN instructions. The configured value can be "" (the empty string) or "container" to indicate that a new UTS namespace to be created, or it can be "host" to indicate that the UTS namespace in which podman itself is being run is reused, or it can be the path to a UTS namespace which is already in use by another process.

--volume, -v=[HOST-DIR:CONTAINER-DIR[:OPTIONS]]

Mount a host directory into containers when executing RUN instructions during the build.

The OPTIONS are a comma-separated list and can be one or more of:

The CONTAINER-DIR must be an absolute path such as /src/docs . The HOST-DIR must be an absolute path as well. Podman bind-mounts the HOST-DIR to the specified path when processing RUN instructions.

You can specify multiple -v options to mount one or more mounts.

You can add the :ro or :rw suffix to a volume to mount it read-only or read-write mode, respectively. By default, the volumes are mounted read-write. See examples.

Chowning Volume Mounts

By default, Podman does not change the owner and group of source volume directories mounted. When running using user namespaces, the UID and GID inside the namespace may correspond to another UID and GID on the host.

The :U suffix tells Podman to use the correct host UID and GID based on the UID and GID within the namespace, to change recursively the owner and group of the source volume.

Warning use with caution since this modifies the host filesystem.

Labeling Volume Mounts

Labeling systems like SELinux require that proper labels are placed on volume content mounted into a container. Without a label, the security system might prevent the processes running inside the container from using the content. By default, Podman does not change the labels set by the OS.

To change a label in the container context, add one of these two suffixes :z or :Z to the volume mount. These suffixes tell Podman to relabel file objects on the shared volumes. The z option tells Podman that two containers share the volume content. As a result, Podman labels the content with a shared content label. Shared volume labels allow all containers to read/write content. The Z option tells Podman to label the content with a private unshared label. Only the current container can use a private volume.

Note: Do not relabel system files and directories. Relabeling system content might cause other confined services on the host machine to fail. For these types of containers, disabling SELinux separation is recommended. The option --security-opt label=disable disables SELinux separation for the container. For example, if a user wanted to volume mount their entire home directory into the build containers, they need to disable SELinux separation.

$ podman build --security-opt label=disable -v $HOME:/home/user .

Overlay Volume Mounts

The :O flag tells Podman to mount the directory from the host as a temporary storage using the Overlay file system. The RUN command containers are allowed to modify contents within the mountpoint and are stored in the container storage in a separate directory. In Overlay FS terms the source directory is the lower, and the container storage directory is the upper. Modifications to the mount point are destroyed when the RUN command finishes executing, similar to a tmpfs mount point.

Any subsequent execution of RUN commands sees the original source directory content, any changes from previous RUN commands no longer exists.

One use case of the overlay mount is sharing the package cache from the host into the container to allow speeding up builds.

Note:

By default bind mounted volumes are private . That means any mounts done inside containers are not be visible on the host and vice versa. This behavior can be changed by specifying a volume mount propagation property.

When the mount propagation policy is set to shared , any mounts completed inside the container on that volume is visible to both the host and container. When the mount propagation policy is set to slave , one way mount propagation is enabled and any mounts completed on the host for that volume is visible only inside of the container. To control the mount propagation property of volume use the :[r]shared , :[r]slave or :[r]private propagation flag. For mount propagation to work on the source mount point (mount point where source dir is mounted on) has to have the right propagation properties. For shared volumes, the source mount point has to be shared. And for slave volumes, the source mount has to be either shared or slave. [1] ⟨ #Footnote1⟩

Use df <source-dir> to determine the source mount and then use findmnt -o TARGET,PROPAGATION <source-mount-dir> to determine propagation properties of source mount, if findmnt utility is not available, the source mount point can be determined by looking at the mount entry in /proc/self/mountinfo . Look at optional fields and see if any propagation properties are specified. shared:X means the mount is shared , master:X means the mount is slave and if nothing is there that means the mount is private . [1] ⟨ #Footnote1⟩

To change propagation properties of a mount point use the mount command. For example, to bind mount the source directory /foo do mount --bind /foo /foo and mount --make-private --make-shared /foo . This converts /foo into a shared mount point. The propagation properties of the source mount can be changed directly. For instance if / is the source mount for /foo , then use mount --make-shared / to convert / into a shared mount.

EXAMPLES

Build named image and manifest list using specified Containerfile with default farm:

$ podman farm build --local -t name -f /path/to/containerfile .

Build named image and manifest list using the specified farm:

$ podman farm build --farm myfarm -t name .

Build named image and manifest list using the specified farm, removing all images from farm nodes, after they are pushed to registry:

$ podman farm build --farm myfarm --cleanup -t name .

Build named images and manifest list for specified platforms using default farm:

$ podman farm build --platforms arm64,amd64 -t name .

SEE ALSO

podman(1) , podman-farm(1) , buildah(1) , containers-certs.d(5) , containers-registries.conf(5) , crun(1) , runc(8) , useradd(8) , Containerfile(5) , containerignore(5)

HISTORY

September 2023, Originally compiled by Urvashi Mohnani <umohnani@redhat.com>

FOOTNOTES

1: The Podman project is committed to inclusivity, a core value of open source. The master and slave mount propagation terminology used here is problematic and divisive, and needs to be changed. However, these terms are currently used within the Linux kernel and must be used as-is at this time. When the kernel maintainers rectify this usage, Podman will follow suit immediately.