Question: Why is node-slim not recommended?

[luebken]

The readme at the Docker hub notes about the slim package:

node:slim
This image does not contain the common packages contained in the default tag and only contains the minimal packages needed to run node. Unless you are working in an environment where only the node image will be deployed and you have space constraints, we highly recommend using the default image of this repository.

But when looking at the Dockerfile 0.10 slim it seems that it is perfectly suitable for runtime.

• Why is it does the readme recommend the default image?
• What runtime usecases would the slim package not be suitable for?

Note: Although Docker does a great deal of caching layers we like to promote smaller images since we see a lot of layer pushing around dev and production workflows.

[puja108]

+1

[chorrell]

That part of the README needs to be reworded I think.

The default image is built off of buildpack-deps:jessie. It's a much bigger image but has pretty much everything needed if you have Node modules that need to be compiled or if you need some kind of lib dependencies etc.

If your app doesn't need to compile any modules or external dependencies than it should be fine.

[luebken]

If your app doesn't need to compile any modules or external dependencies than it should be fine.

What other external dependencies are you thinking?

[chorrell]

I don't have anything particular in mind. It could be anything really, like if a module needs to compile something with gcc, or needs some kind of external lib or something

[chorrell]

Hi,

Would you be willing to raise this as an issue here?

https://github.com/docker-library/docs/issues

I'd like to close this out in favour of that. The description for node:slim needs a bit of rewording.

[luebken]

Sure. Done: docker-library/docs#299