How to use this image

All examples in this guide use the public image. If you've mirrored the repository for your own use (for example, to your Docker Hub namespace), update your commands to reference the mirrored image instead of the public one.

For example:

• Public image: dhi.io/trigger-dev:<tag>
• Mirrored image: <your-namespace>/dhi-trigger-dev:<tag>

For the examples, you must first use docker login dhi.io to authenticate to the registry to pull the images.

Start a trigger-dev container

The dhi/trigger-dev image runs the self-hosted Trigger.dev webapp (API server, scheduler, and dashboard). On startup the image runs Prisma migrations against your Postgres database, optionally runs Goose migrations against ClickHouse, and then starts the Node.js webapp on port 3000.

Trigger.dev requires a Postgres database that has logical replication enabled (wal_level=logical). The minimum set of environment variables the webapp validates at startup is shown in the example below.

Basic usage

$ docker run --rm \
  --name trigger-dev \
  -p 3000:3000 \
  -e DATABASE_URL="postgresql://trigger:[email protected]:5432/trigger?schema=public" \
  -e DIRECT_URL="postgresql://trigger:[email protected]:5432/trigger?schema=public" \
  -e SESSION_SECRET="$(openssl rand -hex 32)" \
  -e MAGIC_LINK_SECRET="$(openssl rand -hex 32)" \
  -e ENCRYPTION_KEY="$(openssl rand -hex 16)" \
  -e DEPLOY_REGISTRY_HOST="registry.example.com" \
  -e SKIP_CLICKHOUSE_MIGRATIONS=1 \
  -e CLICKHOUSE_URL="http://noop" \
  -e REDIS_HOST=host.docker.internal \
  -e REDIS_PORT=6379 \
  -e REDIS_TLS_DISABLED=true \
  dhi.io/trigger-dev:<tag>

Once the container is running, the webapp serves the dashboard at http://localhost:3000 and a plain-text healthcheck at http://localhost:3000/healthcheck (responds OK with HTTP 200 once Postgres is reachable).

The webapp connects to Redis at startup to bootstrap concurrency tracking and several internal queues, so a reachable Redis is required for the container to stay up. Set REDIS_TLS_DISABLED=true when pointing at a Redis instance that does not terminate TLS (most local development setups, including the Compose example below).

With Docker Compose

The following Compose example brings up Postgres (with logical replication enabled), Redis, and the Trigger.dev webapp, with ClickHouse migrations skipped so a single-node deployment can come up with just Postgres + Redis. Replace the placeholder secrets before using this in any non-throwaway environment.

services:
  postgres:
    image: dhi.io/postgres:17
    container_name: trigger-postgres
    # The dhi.io/postgres image's entrypoint already invokes `postgres`, so only
    # pass extra `-c` flags here.
    command: ["-c", "wal_level=logical"]
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: trigger
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: trigger
      POSTGRES_DB: trigger
    ports:
      - "5432:5432"

  redis:
    image: dhi.io/redis:7
    container_name: trigger-redis
    # Disable protected mode so the webapp can connect over the Compose network
    # without configuring Redis auth.
    command: ["redis-server", "--protected-mode", "no"]
    ports:
      - "6379:6379"

  webapp:
    image: dhi.io/trigger-dev:<tag>
    container_name: trigger-webapp
    depends_on:
      - postgres
      - redis
    ports:
      - "3000:3000"
    environment:
      DATABASE_URL: "postgresql://trigger:trigger@postgres:5432/trigger?schema=public"
      DIRECT_URL: "postgresql://trigger:trigger@postgres:5432/trigger?schema=public"
      # DATABASE_HOST makes the entrypoint block until Postgres accepts TCP
      # connections, which avoids a race between Compose's `depends_on: started`
      # and Postgres finishing initialization.
      DATABASE_HOST: "postgres:5432"
      REDIS_HOST: redis
      REDIS_PORT: "6379"
      # The bundled Redis worker clients default to TLS; disable for the local
      # plaintext Redis above.
      REDIS_TLS_DISABLED: "true"
      # Replace the three secrets below before using this in any non-throwaway
      # environment. ENCRYPTION_KEY must be exactly 32 bytes; generate with
      # `openssl rand -hex 16` to get a 32-character hex string.
      SESSION_SECRET: "replace-with-32-byte-hex-secret"
      MAGIC_LINK_SECRET: "replace-with-32-byte-hex-secret"
      ENCRYPTION_KEY: "replace-with-32-char-hex-key-aaa"
      DEPLOY_REGISTRY_HOST: "registry.example.com"
      SKIP_CLICKHOUSE_MIGRATIONS: "1"
      CLICKHOUSE_URL: "http://noop"

Required environment variables

The Trigger.dev webapp validates its environment on startup and exits if any of the following are missing or invalid. See the upstream apps/webapp/app/env.server.ts for the authoritative list.

Trigger.dev exposes many additional configuration variables (S3-compatible object storage, OAuth providers, Sentry, worker tuning, etc.). See the upstream Trigger.dev self-hosting guide at https://trigger.dev/docs/self-hosting/overview⁠ for the complete reference.

Common trigger-dev use cases

Running migrations against an external Postgres

The image's entrypoint runs prisma migrate deploy on every start. To run migrations as a one-off without starting the webapp, override the entrypoint on the dev variant:

$ docker run --rm \
  -e DATABASE_URL="postgresql://trigger:[email protected]:5432/trigger?schema=public" \
  -e DIRECT_URL="postgresql://trigger:[email protected]:5432/trigger?schema=public" \
  --entrypoint /triggerdotdev/node_modules/.bin/prisma \
  dhi.io/trigger-dev:<tag>-dev \
  migrate deploy --schema /triggerdotdev/internal-packages/database/prisma/schema.prisma

Running ClickHouse schema migrations with Goose

When CLICKHOUSE_URL is set and SKIP_CLICKHOUSE_MIGRATIONS is not 1, the entrypoint runs the bundled /usr/local/bin/goose against internal-packages/clickhouse/schema. To run migrations explicitly without starting the webapp, override the entrypoint on the dev variant:

$ docker run --rm \
  -e GOOSE_DRIVER=clickhouse \
  -e GOOSE_DBSTRING="tcp://default:@clickhouse:9000/default?secure=true" \
  --entrypoint /usr/local/bin/goose \
  dhi.io/trigger-dev:<tag>-dev \
  -dir /triggerdotdev/internal-packages/clickhouse/schema up

Health-checking the webapp

The webapp serves a plain-text healthcheck at /healthcheck that returns OK with HTTP 200 once Postgres is reachable. Use it as a Kubernetes readiness probe or as a Compose healthcheck sidecar:

  healthcheck-sidecar:
    image: dhi.io/busybox:1
    depends_on:
      - webapp
    command:
      - sh
      - -c
      - "until wget -q -O - http://webapp:3000/healthcheck | grep -q OK; do sleep 2; done"

Non-hardened images vs. Docker Hardened Images

The DHI trigger-dev image differs from upstream ghcr.io/triggerdotdev/trigger.dev in a few intentional ways:

• Runs as nonroot. The webapp process runs as UID/GID 65532:65532 (instead of upstream's node user, UID/GID 1000:1000). The image's working directory /triggerdotdev and the per-start writable subdirectory /triggerdotdev/apps/webapp/prisma are owned by this user. If you bind-mount writable state into the container, ensure the host directory is writable by UID 65532 — volumes previously chowned for upstream's UID 1000 will need re-chowning.
• No shell or package manager in the runtime variant. The runtime image ships only the binaries needed by the entrypoint (dumb-init, node, goose, nc.openbsd, prisma from node_modules/.bin, plus dash, coreutils, grep, and sed consumed by the entrypoint script and pnpm shims). For interactive debugging use the -dev tag or Docker Debug⁠.
• Entrypoint wrapper invokes Prisma directly. Upstream's entrypoint shells out to pnpm --filter @trigger.dev/database db:migrate:deploy, which requires pnpm at runtime. The DHI image invokes Prisma's CLI directly via /triggerdotdev/node_modules/.bin/prisma and uses nc.openbsd for the optional DATABASE_HOST wait loop. Behavior parity is preserved: Prisma migrations run, then optional Goose ClickHouse migrations, then the webapp starts.
• FIPS variants apply to Node and Go. The -fips and -fips-dev tags chain Docker's OpenSSL FIPS provider via OPENSSL_CONF=/usr/lib/ssl/fips.cnf, which declares a nodejs_conf section so Node's OpenSSL routes through the FIPS provider, and ship the embedded goose binary compiled against the FIPS Go toolchain with GODEBUG=fips140=on.

Image variants

Docker Hardened Images come in different variants depending on their intended use. Image variants are identified by their tag.

• Runtime variants are designed to run your application in production. These images are intended to be used either directly or as the FROM image in the final stage of a multi-stage build. These images typically:

  • Run as a nonroot user
  • Do not include a shell or a package manager
  • Contain only the minimal set of libraries needed to run the app

• Build-time variants typically include dev in the tag name and are intended for use in the first stage of a multi-stage Dockerfile. These images typically:

  • Run as the root user
  • Include a shell and package manager
  • Are used to build or compile applications

• FIPS variants include fips in the variant name and tag. They come in both runtime and build-time variants. These variants use cryptographic modules that have been validated under FIPS 140, a U.S. government standard for secure cryptographic operations. For example, usage of MD5 fails in FIPS variants.

To view the image variants and get more information about them, select the Tags tab for this repository, and then select a tag.

Migrate to a Docker Hardened Image

To migrate your application to a Docker Hardened Image, you must update your Dockerfile. At minimum, you must update the base image in your existing Dockerfile to a Docker Hardened Image. This and a few other common changes are listed in the following table of migration notes.

The following steps outline the general migration process.

1. Find hardened images for your app.

   A hardened image may have several variants. Inspect the image tags and find the image variant that meets your needs.

2. Update the base image in your Dockerfile.

   Update the base image in your application's Dockerfile to the hardened image you found in the previous step. For framework images, this is typically going to be an image tagged as dev because it has the tools needed to install packages and dependencies.

3. For multi-stage Dockerfiles, update the runtime image in your Dockerfile.

   To ensure that your final image is as minimal as possible, you should use a multi-stage build. All stages in your Dockerfile should use a hardened image. While intermediary stages will typically use images tagged as dev, your final runtime stage should use a non-dev image variant.

4. Install additional packages

   Docker Hardened Images contain minimal packages in order to reduce the potential attack surface. You may need to install additional packages in your Dockerfile. Inspect the image variants to identify which packages are already installed.

   Only images tagged as dev typically have package managers. You should use a multi-stage Dockerfile to install the packages. Install the packages in the build stage that uses a dev image. Then, if needed, copy any necessary artifacts to the runtime stage that uses a non-dev image.

   For Alpine-based images, you can use apk to install packages. For Debian-based images, you can use apt-get to install packages.

Troubleshooting migration

The following are common issues that you may encounter during migration.

General debugging

The hardened images intended for runtime don't contain a shell nor any tools for debugging. The recommended method for debugging applications built with Docker Hardened Images is to use Docker Debug⁠ to attach to these containers. Docker Debug provides a shell, common debugging tools, and lets you install other tools in an ephemeral, writable layer that only exists during the debugging session.

Permissions

By default image variants intended for runtime, run as the nonroot user. Ensure that necessary files and directories are accessible to the nonroot user. You may need to copy files to different directories or change permissions so your application running as the nonroot user can access them.

Privileged ports

Non-dev hardened images run as a nonroot user by default. As a result, applications in these images can't bind to privileged ports (below 1024) when running in Kubernetes or in Docker Engine versions older than 20.10. To avoid issues, configure your application to listen on port 1025 or higher inside the container, even if you map it to a lower port on the host. For example, docker run -p 80:8080 my-image will work because the port inside the container is 8080, and docker run -p 80:81 my-image won't work because the port inside the container is 81.

No shell

By default, image variants intended for runtime don't contain a shell. Use dev images in build stages to run shell commands and then copy any necessary artifacts into the runtime stage. In addition, use Docker Debug to debug containers with no shell.

Entry point

Docker Hardened Images may have different entry points than images such as Docker Official Images. Use docker inspect to inspect entry points for Docker Hardened Images and update your Dockerfile if necessary.