rwx-cloud/build-push-action

GitHub Action for building OCI-compliant container images on RWX.

Building images on RWX is substantially faster and more ergonomic than building images with docker build due to techniques detailed in this blog post.

See more information on building OCI-compliant container images in our documentation.

Usage

Basic Example

name: Build Image

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      - uses: rwx-cloud/build-push-action@v1
        with:
          access-token: ${{ secrets.RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN }}
          file: .rwx/build.yml
          target: app

Pushing to Registries

Any docker registry supported by the docker/login-action is also supported by RWX. Logging in using that action will generate the necessary docker config used by the RWX CLI to push images.

Below are some common examples. See the docker/login-action documentation for information on how to authenticate with other registries.

Docker Hub

name: Build and Push to Docker Hub

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      
      - name: Login to Docker Hub
        uses: docker/login-action@v3
        with:
          username: ${{ secrets.DOCKER_USERNAME }}
          password: ${{ secrets.DOCKER_PASSWORD }}
      
      - uses: rwx-cloud/build-push-action@v1
        with:
          access-token: ${{ secrets.RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN }}
          file: .rwx/build.yml
          target: app
          push-to: docker.io/myusername/myapp:latest

AWS ECR (Elastic Container Registry)

name: Build and Push to AWS ECR

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    permissions:
      id-token: write
      contents: read
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      
      - name: Configure AWS credentials
        uses: aws-actions/configure-aws-credentials@v4
        with:
          role-to-assume: arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/github-actions-role
          aws-region: us-east-1
      
      - name: Login to ECR
        uses: docker/login-action@v3
        with:
          registry: 123456789.dkr.ecr.us-east-1.amazonaws.com
      
      - uses: rwx-cloud/build-push-action@v1
        with:
          access-token: ${{ secrets.RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN }}
          file: .rwx/build.yml
          target: app
          push-to: 123456789.dkr.ecr.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/myapp:latest

Init Parameters

Init params can be passed as either comma-separated key/value pairs or as JSON. These should match the init params in your RWX run definition.

Comma-separated string example

name: Build Image with Parameters

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      - uses: rwx-cloud/build-push-action@v1
        with:
          access-token: ${{ secrets.RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN }}
          file: .rwx/build.yml
          target: app
          init: 'version=1.2.3,env=production'

JSON example

name: Build Image with JSON Parameters

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      - uses: rwx-cloud/build-push-action@v1
        with:
          access-token: ${{ secrets.RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN }}
          file: .rwx/build.yml
          target: app
          init: '{"version":"1.2.3","env":"production"}'

Build And Pull Simultaneously

By default, this action will not pull the built image to your local Docker daemon after building. Use pull: true if you intend to use the image in additional steps within the same job.

name: Build Image (No Pull)

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      - uses: rwx-cloud/build-push-action@v1
        with:
          access-token: ${{ secrets.RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN }}
          file: .rwx/build.yml
          target: app
          pull: true

Using Outputs

When Pushing to a Registry

When push-to is provided, image-reference is a Docker image reference that can be used with docker pull:

name: Build, Push, and Use Image

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      
      - name: Login to Docker Hub
        uses: docker/login-action@v3
        with:
          username: ${{ secrets.DOCKER_USERNAME }}
          password: ${{ secrets.DOCKER_PASSWORD }}
      
      - uses: rwx-cloud/build-push-action@v1
        id: build
        with:
          access-token: ${{ secrets.RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN }}
          file: .rwx/build.yml
          target: app
          push-to: docker.io/myusername/myapp:latest
      
      - name: Display outputs
        run: |
          echo "Image Reference: ${{ steps.build.outputs.image-reference }}"
          echo "Run URL: ${{ steps.build.outputs.run-url }}"
      
      - name: Pull and use the image
        run: |
          docker pull ${{ steps.build.outputs.image-reference }}
          docker run --rm ${{ steps.build.outputs.image-reference }} echo "Image works!"
      
      - name: Display JSON output
        run: |
          echo '${{ steps.build.outputs.json }}' | jq .

When Not Pushing to a Registry

When push-to is not provided, image-reference contains the full RWX image reference (e.g., cloud.rwx.com/rwx:abc123...). Use rwx image pull to pull the image. The RWX CLI is already installed by this action and available in subsequent steps:

name: Build and Pull by Task ID

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      
      - uses: rwx-cloud/build-push-action@v1
        id: build
        with:
          access-token: ${{ secrets.RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN }}
          file: .rwx/build.yml
          target: app
      
      - name: Display outputs
        run: |
          echo "Image Reference: ${{ steps.build.outputs.image-reference }}"
          echo "Run URL: ${{ steps.build.outputs.run-url }}"
      
      - name: Pull image using RWX CLI
        env:
          RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN }}
        run: |
          rwx image pull ${{ steps.build.outputs.image-reference }}
          # Image is now available in local Docker
          docker images | grep ${{ steps.build.outputs.image-reference }}

Sharing Outputs Across Jobs

To use outputs from this action in another job, set them as job outputs:

name: Build and Deploy

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    outputs:
      image-reference: ${{ steps.build.outputs.image-reference }}
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      
      - name: Login to Docker Hub
        uses: docker/login-action@v3
        with:
          username: ${{ secrets.DOCKER_USERNAME }}
          password: ${{ secrets.DOCKER_PASSWORD }}
      
      - uses: rwx-cloud/build-push-action@v1
        id: build
        with:
          access-token: ${{ secrets.RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN }}
          file: .rwx/build.yml
          target: app
          push-to: docker.io/myusername/myapp:latest

  deploy:
    needs: build
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - name: Use image from build job
        run: |
          echo "Deploying image: ${{ needs.build.outputs.image-reference }}"
          docker pull ${{ needs.build.outputs.image-reference }}
          # ... deploy using the image

Inputs

Input	Description	Required	Default
access-token	RWX access token	Yes	-
file	Path to RWX config file (e.g., .rwx/build.yml)	Yes	-
target	Task key to build	Yes	-
init	Init parameters as JSON object or key=value pairs (comma-separated)	No	-
push-to	Registry reference to push to. Format: registry.com/namespace/image:tag. Requires Docker to be authenticated to the registry (e.g., via docker/login-action).	No	-
pull	Pull the built image to local Docker after building.	No	false
cache	Enable RWX cache. Set to false to disable caching.	No	true
timeout	Build timeout (e.g., 30m, 1h)	No	30m

Outputs

Output	Description
image-reference	Full image reference (Docker registry reference if pushed, otherwise RWX image reference)
run-url	URL to view the run in RWX Cloud
json	Complete JSON object with all details

Requirements

• RWX access token (set as RWX_ACCESS_TOKEN secret in GitHub)
• RWX config file (typically in .rwx/ directory)
• Docker (if pushing to registries or pulling images)
• Pre-authentication with your chosen registry, using the docker/login-action, as described above (if you want to push the image to a registry).

License

MIT