Feature request: Make latest tag point to latest release and not a dev build

[Huskydog9988]

What's the feature? 🧐

Make the latest tag in docker point to the latest release instead of a dev build.

• Allows the user to just select the image, and know they are getting something stable
• Doesn't require the user to seek out the latest version number to know they are running the latest and greatest
• Follows the normal docker tag convention
  • This being that latest stable release is found on the latest tag, and dev builds on something like the dev tag
• Falls in like with the provided run command as that points to specific version, just the latest dev build
• Makes setup much easier as people don't have to painfully realize they are running experimental software

Optional extra information 🚀

• I think this has been presented before but I couldn't that if it is the case

[qdm12]

Hey nice suggestion.

Although, this is going to sound totally selfish... but I CRAVE user feedback!

There are so many aspects/features and different vpn providers, I can't (even with more tests) possibly ensure by myself that everything works.

I also doubt anyone would use the :dev image really.

I'm doing my best making sure :latest works through tests and by running it myself with Mullvad.

So far, I use :latest to know when it's stable to do releases actually. I do releases once:

• latest has been out for a few days without changes and reported bug
• or before pushing big error prone changes to master

So, yes the user run experimental code, but that feels to me like a critical piece to have fast development and stable releases.

On the other hand, I could have another tag like latest-stable pointing to the last release, would that interest you?

[Huskydog9988]

The idea of the latest-stable as a tag is all I'm really looking for. If you were to implement it, I would most certainty utilize it.

[qdm12]

Would a :v3 tag be alright instead? And it would point to the latest v3.x.x release, since I may do a v4.0.0 release one day.

I'll also try to do e. g. v3.21 tags pointing to the latest v3.21.x release.

[Huskydog9988]

All of that would be good, I actually like the v3 tag idea more as that would minimize braking changes. The only concern I would have is the v3.21 tag idea. It seems like there are very few patches and much more minor changes, thus the tag wouldn't get much use.

[jathek]

You seem to be doing it through custom code in your action, so you'll probably just tweak that, but the below usage of docker/metadata-action handles it pretty well for me.

• when I push github tag vX.Y.Z, I get image tags latest, X, X.Y, and X.Y.Z
• when I push github tag random, I get image tag random
• when I push anything to main, I get image tag main

Below is easily tweaked to give latest whenever you push to main.

      - name: Check for semver tag
        id: semvercheck
        run: |
          if [[ ${{ github.ref }} =~ ^refs/tags/v[0-9]+\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]+$ ]]; then
            MATCH=true
          else
            MATCH=false
          fi
          if [[ ! ${{ github.ref }} =~ ^refs/tags/v0\. ]]; then
            MATCH=$MATCH_nonzero
          fi
          echo ::set-output name=match::$MATCH

      # extract metadata (tags, labels) for Docker
      # https://github.com/docker/metadata-action
      - name: Extract Docker metadata
        id: meta
        uses: docker/metadata-action@v3
        with:
          flavor: |
            latest=false
          images: |
            ${{ env.IMAGE_NAME }}
            ${{ env.GHCR }}/${{ env.IMAGE_NAME }}
          tags: |
            type=ref,event=branch
            type=ref,event=pr
            type=ref,event=tag,enable=${{ !startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
            type=semver,pattern={{version}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
            type=semver,pattern={{major}}.{{minor}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
            type=semver,pattern={{major}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true_nonzero') }}
            type=raw,value=latest,enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}

Edited to fix some minor warnings when the semver tag pattern noticed a non-semver tag.

[qdm12]

Thanks @nearcatch this definitely helped.

In the end I'm using:

      - name: Check for semver tag
        id: semvercheck
        run: |
          if [[ ${{ github.ref }} =~ ^refs/tags/v[0-9]+\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]+$ ]]; then
            MATCH=true
          else
            MATCH=false
          fi
          if [[ ! ${{ github.ref }} =~ ^refs/tags/v0\. ]]; then
            MATCH=$MATCH_nonzero
          fi
          echo ::set-output name=match::$MATCH

      # extract metadata (tags, labels) for Docker
      # https://github.com/docker/metadata-action
      - name: Extract Docker metadata
        id: meta
        uses: docker/metadata-action@v3
        with:
          flavor: |
            latest=${{ github.ref == 'refs/heads/master' }}
          images: |
            qmcgaw/gluetun
            qmcgaw/private-internet-access
          tags: |
            type=ref,event=branch,enable=${{ github.ref != 'refs/heads/master' }}
            type=ref,event=pr
            type=ref,event=tag,enable=${{ !startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
            type=semver,pattern=v{{major}}.{{minor}}.{{patch}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
            type=semver,pattern=v{{major}}.{{minor}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
            type=semver,pattern=v{{major}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true_nonzero') }}
            type=raw,value=latest,enable=${{ !startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}

It seems to push :latest on commits pushed to master, and I'll check if it works on the next Github release. Let's wait for next release to make sure this works before closing it.

[qdm12]

@nearcatch unfortunately

gluetun/.github/workflows/ci.yml

Lines 122 to 128 in b9a9319

	type=ref,event=branch,enable=${{ github.ref != 'refs/heads/master' }}
	type=ref,event=pr
	type=ref,event=tag,enable=${{ !startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
	type=semver,pattern=v{{major}}.{{minor}}.{{patch}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
	type=semver,pattern=v{{major}}.{{minor}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
	type=semver,pattern=v{{major}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true_nonzero') }}
	type=raw,value=latest,enable=${{ !startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}

and

gluetun/.github/workflows/ci.yml

Line 143 in b9a9319

tags: ${{ steps.meta.outputs.tags }}

only pushed v3.26.0 on the last release. Any idea how to fix it to push also v3 and v3.26?

Workflow relevant logs:

https://github.com/qdm12/gluetun/runs/4340897678?check_suite_focus=true#step:7:26

[jathek]

only pushed v3.26.0 on the last release. Any idea how to fix it to push also v3 and v3.26?

I have no idea why but it's actually failing here, with any semver tag that isn't v0.Y.Z. This makes the semvercheck.outputs.match variable empty. Then the v<major>.<minor>.<patch> semver is being published by this line, as the raw tag:

gluetun/.github/workflows/ci.yml

Line 124 in b9a9319

type=ref,event=tag,enable=${{ !startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}

while these lines for the v<major>, v<major>.<minor>, and v<major>.<minor>.<patch> semver tags are ignored:

gluetun/.github/workflows/ci.yml

Lines 125 to 127 in b9a9319

	type=semver,pattern=v{{major}}.{{minor}}.{{patch}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
	type=semver,pattern=v{{major}}.{{minor}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true') }}
	type=semver,pattern=v{{major}},enable=${{ startsWith(steps.semvercheck.outputs.match, 'true_nonzero') }}

I've done some quick testing and this code seems to work properly with non-zero semver tags:

      - name: Check for semver tag
        id: semvercheck
        run: |
          if [[ ${{ github.ref }} =~ ^refs\/tags\/v0\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]+$ ]]; then
            MATCH=true
          else
            MATCH=false
          fi
          if [[ ${{ github.ref }} =~ ^refs\/tags\/v[1-9]+\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]+$ ]]; then
            MATCH=true_nonzero
          fi
          echo ::set-output name=match::$MATCH

[qdm12]

Thanks @nearcatch

Changes applied in 55e609c unfortunately it still didn't work for v3.27.0 😢 logs. I'll try again for v3.28.0 next time.

[qdm12]

I'm going to write my own Github action to do all this, the current build setup is just misbehaving and hard to reason about/configure. Key points will be:

• on pr tag as :pr-PRID
• do not do anything on push to branches other than master/main
• on push to master/main, tag as :latest
• on tag
  • tag as v0.1 and v0.1.0 for semver starting with v0
  • tag as v3, v3.28 and v3.28.0 for semver nit starting with v0
  • tag as :tagname otherwise

I'll try to get this done asap for release v3.28.0.

[qdm12]

Done in 2b09b9c! 👍 I ended up fixing the existing docker-meta action this morning.

You now have image tag :v3, :v3.28 and v3.28.0 all pointing to the same image. You might want to use image tag :v3 to only update once it's relatively stable. The :latest tag still points to the master branch.