narrative-base-image

The base Docker image for the Narrative application.

This grew from the original kbase/narrbase image that was part of the kbase/narrative repo. This contains various dependencies that the Narrative app depends on, but tend to update at a slower frequency. Also, this image takes a good half hour to build, which isn't great for rapid prototyping of the Narrative app itself, or easy review of pull requests.

Thus, the need for a separate base image.

Dependencies

R

R dependencies are installed via the install-r-packages.R script that is run during the Docker image build. Add and maintain R packages there.

NodeJS

No node packages are installed (i.e. there's no package.json here), but the core Node program version is maintained here. This is set in the Dockerfile itself.

Python

The image uses a version of the default maintained Python image. No other python packages are installed here.

Building the image

Build the image with: docker build -t kbase/narrative-base-image:$VERSION .

Versioning rules

This follows the usual semantic versioning format - vA.B.C, with the following guidelines:

• patch versions change when one or more dependencies are updated
• minor versions change when one or more dependencies are added or removed
• major versions change if and when major structural changes are made. These include, but may not be limited to:
  • adding/removing dependent languages (like if we drop R support or add Rust support)
  • combining or creating new dependency tracking files
  • any dependency change that may require a major update to Narrative management (i.e. including JupyterLab, base Python version change, switching from Debian to another distribution, etc.)