Docker doesn't create custom node-red image

Question

I'm new to docker and I've been trying to create a custom node-red image with custom flow for influxdb. Docker doesn't seem to use my dockerfile for the image creation.

This is my docker-compose:

node-red:
    container_name: node-red
    build: node-red
    environment:
      - TZ=Europe/Amsterdam
    ports:
      - "1880:1880"
    volumes:
      - node-red-data:/tmp/node-red_data
    networks:
      - node-red-net

Then, inside a folder called node-red I have this dockerfile:

FROM nodered/node-red AS base

COPY package.json .
RUN npm install --only=production

COPY nodered_flow.json /data/flows.json


CMD ["npm", "start"]

Both the package.json and the nodered_flow.json are in the same folder as the dockerfile. What am I doing wrong here?

Answer 1

In service.build, you need the path to the build context, in case the it is in the same directory you could use .. So this should work:

node-red:
    container_name: node-red
    build: .
    environment:
      - TZ=Europe/Amsterdam
    ports:
      - "1880:1880"
    volumes:
      - node-red-data:/tmp/node-red_data
    networks:
      - node-red-net

For more information check: https://docs.docker.com/compose/compose-file/compose-file-v3/#build

Answer 2

Your Dockerfile is wrong, it's putting your package.json in /usr/src/node-red and when you run npm install it will remove Node-RED.

It should look like this:

FROM nodered/node-red AS base

WORKDIR /data
COPY package.json /data
COPY nodered_flow.json /data/flows.json
RUN npm install --only=production
WORKDIR /usr/src/node-red