npm install and run dev for laravel / vue on Docker container start

Question

I am trying to automate installing and compiling JavaScript/Vue files and dependencies in a Laravel application in Docker. It is a simple Application that signs a Guestbook.

I have compiled a php:7.1.12-fpm container with all the required PHP Dependencies as well as Node 8.x packages. When the PHP container starts, npm 5.6.0 is available should I access it from the container's shell. Right now I have to go into this container and manually run "npm install" and "npm run dev" to install JavaScript Dependencies and compile Vue files.

I would like that to happen at the start of the docker-compose command. To do this I tried adding a Node container and having it execute these two commands. This is the docker-compose.xml for the Node container:

node:
    image: "node:8"
    user: "node"
    working_dir: /home/node/app
    environment:
      - NODE_ENV=production
    volumes:
      - ./web:/home/node/app
    expose:
      - "8081"
    command: npm install && npm run dev

Unfortunately running with the above docker-compose.xml for the Node container results in this error:

node_1     | npm ERR! code EINVALIDTAGNAME
node_1     | npm ERR! Invalid tag name "&&": Tags may not have any characters that encodeURIComponent encodes.
node_1     |
node_1     | npm ERR! A complete log of this run can be found in:
node_1     | npm ERR!     /home/node/.npm/_logs/2018-01-28T16_43_49_599Z-debug.log
laravelvuejsguestbook_node_1 exited with code 1

I suspect I have to somehow escape the && but I am not sure how to achieve this.

I would appreciate any assistance as to what needs to be done so that npm installs the dependencies and compiles the Vue files at the startup of the docker-compose command.

Answer 1

Try changing your compose command statement to something as below -

command: bash -c "npm install && npm run dev"

PS - Tested with a sample package.json, it works when we use bash -c "" & not sh -c ""(default compose command run), not really sure about the exact reason though. Hope it can be of some help to you.