NOTE: This respository and its contents are currently under construction, thus, there are no releases yet of its tools, etc.

This repository contains various container utilities, e.g., scripts, to assist with various container technologies.

A particular aim of this repository is to provide a way to build base (Linux) images that are not dependent on third-party repositories. For example, when creating Apptainer images often individuals use Docker's repositories to generate those, e.g., Debian/Ubuntu, images which should instead pull the binaries, etc. needed from the site where such was originally released from. For Debian and Ubuntu, using the debootstrap program allows this to be done elegantly.

A significant reason for using containers is to enable running old programs in old environments. It may or may not be easy to obtain an image for old Linux environments and this repository aims to have scripts, etc. capable of producing such images as far back as is possible/reasonable.

The Apptainer image build scripts build minimal, or close to minimal, images. Typically one will need to generate a sandbox image to add more software, etc. Such could be done by running:

# 1. Extract the SIF file contents in to a directory...
sudo apptainer build -s image-work.dir filename.sif

# 2. Update the directory image...
sudo apptainer shell -C -w image-work.dir/ filename.sif

# 3. When done build a new SIF image...
sudo apptainer build new-filename.sif image-work.dir/

SCRIPT: bin/apptainer-build-linux-debian-image.sh

This script builds Debian Linux Apptainer SIF image files using debootstrap, sudo, and apptainer pulling the source binary files from Debian's repositories --not Docker repositories. Old end-of-life releases as well as new releases can be easily built.

NOTE: Root permissions are required to execute this script. See the bottom of the script for commands and uncomment the desired commands to build an image.

SCRIPT: bin/apptainer-build-linux-ubuntu-image.sh

This script builds Ubuntu Linux Apptainer SIF image files using debootstrap, sudo, and apptainer pulling the source binary files from Ubuntu's repositories --not Docker repositories. Old end-of-life releases as well as new releases can be easily built.

NOTE: Root permissions are required to execute this script. See the bottom of the script for commands and uncomment the desired commands to build an image.