Can I build a Docker image using Singularity from the login node?

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Hi all, I would like to pull and build a Docker image for my research. However I have probably a very stupid question, which is - Can I run

singularity pull docker://foo/foobar:x.x.x

from the login node or do I need to do something else before I start using singularity to pull/build the container? The documentation wasn’t very clear about whether I can do it from the login node, and since I am pretty new to dealing with an HPC I didn’t want to disrupt things by doing something wrong :slight_smile:

Thanks in advance!

2

Hi,

thanks for asking! Building a singularity image on the login node is something acceptable. Of course, doing so on a compute node is better, but not required. :wink:

1 Like
3

Dear Bharathkumar,

I will recommend you to build your docker container on your private machine, then pushed to Docker Hub and pull it on your HPC login/compute node from the Docker Hub. Building a container on your machine helps you easily validate that all your tasks run smooth and in the way you want.

Building a container on the login node, could be painful. Well, it depends how complex your container should be.

Cheers,
Max