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FAQ

General​

What is the Dagger Platform?​

We're building the devops operating system, an integrated platform to orchestrate the delivery of applications to the cloud from start to finish. The Dagger Platform includes the Dagger Engine, Dagger Cloud, and the Dagger SDKs. Soon we will deliver the capability to publish and leverage prebuilt modules to further accelerate the adoption of Dagger across an organization's pipelines.

How do I install Dagger?​

Refer to the documentation for information on how to install the Dagger CLI.

How do I update Dagger?​

To install a Dagger CLI that matches your OS & architecture, run the following:

curl -fsSL https://dl.dagger.io/dagger/install.sh | BIN_DIR=$HOME/.local/bin sh

This installs dagger in $HOME/.local/bin:

Homebrew users can alternatively use the following commands:

brew update
brew upgrade dagger

How do I uninstall Dagger?​

  1. Remove the Dagger CLI using the following command:

    sudo rm /usr/local/bin/dagger

    Homebrew users can alternatively use the following command:

    brew uninstall dagger

  2. Remove the Dagger container using the following commands:

    docker rm --force --volumes "$(docker ps --quiet --filter='name=^dagger-engine-')"

  3. Remove the dagger sub-directory of your local cache and configuration directories ($XDG_CACHE_HOME and $XDG_CONFIG_HOME on Linux or the equivalent for other platforms):

    rm -rf ~/Library/Caches/dagger
    rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/dagger
    note

    The paths listed above are defaults and may require adjustment for your specific environment. The third-party packages Dagger uses to determine these paths are listed below:

What compatibility is there between the Dagger Engine, Dagger SDKs and Dagger CLI versions?​

  • The Dagger CLI is released in tandem with the Dagger Engine and thus shares a version number with it.
  • Dagger SDKs automatically provision a Dagger Engine at a compatible version.

Each release notes the compatible Dagger Engine version in its release notes. If running from the CLI, or providing a CLI for the SDK to use via the _EXPERIMENTAL_DAGGER_CLI_BIN variable, check the release notes of the SDK, which indicate the required CLI and Engine versions.

The image below shows an example of the compatibility information available in the release notes:

Release information

Does Dagger send telemetry?​

By default, the Dagger CLI sends anonymized telemetry to dagger.io. This allows us to improve Dagger by understanding how it is used. Telemetry is optional and can be disabled at any time. If you are willing and able to leave telemetry enabled: thank you! This will help us better understand how Dagger is used, and will allow us to improve your experience.

What telemetry does Dagger send?​

The following information is included in telemetry:

  • Dagger version
  • Platform information
  • Command run
  • Anonymous device ID

We use telemetry for aggregate analysis, and do not tie telemetry events to a specific identity. Our telemetry implementation is open-source and can be reviewed in our GitHub repository.

Can Dagger telemetry be disabled?​

Dagger implements the Console Do Not Track (DNT) standard. As a result, you can disable the telemetry by setting the environment variable DO_NOT_TRACK=1 before running the Dagger CLI.

Can I run the Dagger Engine as a "rootless" container?​

No. "Rootless mode" means running the Dagger Engine as a container without the --privileged flag. In this case, the container would not run as the "root" user of the system. Currently, the Dagger Engine cannot be run as a rootless container; network and filesystem constraints related to rootless usage would significantly limit its capabilities and performance. This also means that Dagger is not compatible with platforms which do not support privileged containers, such as AWS Fargate and GKE Autopilot. Read more about these constraints.

Can I configure the Dagger Engine?​

Yes. By replacing the /etc/dagger/engine.toml file with your custom configuration, you can configure the Dagger Engine with CA certs, registry mirrors or additional privileges. However, note that this is a temporary solution and may change in future. Read more about Dagger Engine configuration.

Can I use Dagger Engine to build Windows Containers?​

Unfortunately, not right now. Dagger runs on top of BuildKit and support for Windows Containers is still experimental in BuildKit. In addition, Dagger has a lot of custom code written on top of BuildKit such as networking, init systems, and Linux namespace entries, that do not have exact parallels on Windows.

I am stuck. How can I get help?​

Join us on Discord, and ask your question in our help forum. Our team will be happy to help you there!

Dagger Cloud​

What is Dagger Cloud?​

Dagger Cloud complements the Dagger Engine with a production-grade control plane. Features of Dagger Cloud include pipeline visualization, operational insights, and distributed caching.

Is Dagger Cloud a hosting service for Dagger Engines?​

No, Dagger Cloud is a "bring your own compute" service. The Dagger Engine can run on a wide variety of machines, including most development and CI platforms. If the Dagger Engine can run on it, then Dagger Cloud supports it.

Which CI providers does Dagger Cloud work with?​

Because the Dagger Engine can integrate seamlessly with practically any CI, there is no limit to the type and number of CI providers that Dagger Cloud can work with to provide Dagger pipeline visualization, operational insights, and distributed caching. Users report successfully leveraging Dagger with: GitLab, CircleCI, GitHub Actions, Jenkins,Tekton and many more.

What is pipeline visualization?​

Traces, a browser-based interface focused on tracing and debugging Dagger pipeline runs. A Trace contains detailed information about the steps performed by the pipeline. Traces let you visualize each step of your pipeline, drill down to detailed logs, understand how long operations took to run, and whether operations were cached.

What operational insights does Dagger Cloud provide?​

Dagger Cloud collects telemetry from all your organization's Dagger Engines, whether they run in development or CI, and presents it all to you in one place. This gives you a unique view on all pipelines, both pre-push and post-push.

What is distributed caching?​

One of Dagger's superpowers is that it caches everything. On a single machine (like a laptop or long-running server), caching "just works", because the same Dagger Engine writing to the cache is also reading from it. But in a multi-machine configuration (like an elastic CI cluster), things get more complicated because all machines are continuously producing and consuming large amounts of cache data. How do we get the right cache data to the right machine at the right time, without wasting compute, networking, or storage resources? This is a complex problem which requires a distributed caching service, to orchestrate the movement of data between all machines in the cluster, and a centralized storage service. Because Dagger Cloud receives telemetry from all Dagger Engines, it can model the state of the cluster and make optimal caching decisions. The more telemetry data it receives, the smarter it becomes.

Does distributed caching support ephemeral CI runners?​

Yes. Ephemeral runners, by definition, lack caching; the runner's local storage is purged when the runner is spun down. However, when your CI is connected to Dagger Cloud, these ephemeral runners gain all the benefits of a persistent shared cache.

Does Dagger Cloud store my cache data?​

Yes. For distributed caching to work, it requires two components: a centralized storage service and an orchestrator. Dagger Cloud provides both, in one integrated package.

Where does Dagger Cloud store my cache data?​

Dagger Cloud features a global data storage service spanning 26 regions across 3 cloud providers: AWS, Google Cloud Platform, and Cloudflare R2. The region closest to your compute is automatically selected.

Does Dagger Cloud support "bring your own storage" for distributed caching?​

The ability to "bring your own storage" is coming soon. Please reach out to us if this capability is needed for your organization.

Why am I seeing dagger functions in the local trace list?​

All commands that require module initialization at an engine level will send telemetry to Dagger Cloud. Dagger needs to introspect a module to be able to print the available functions in a module, so it calls dagger functions. This happens for both local and remote runs, which is why the calls appears in the local trace list.

How does Dagger classify Traces as originating from "CI" or "local"?​

Dagger is aware of the context it runs on. When it runs in a CI context like GitHub, GitLab, CircleCI, or Jenkins, additional Trace metadata is displayed based on the Git repository information available. For this reason, it is important for Dagger to run in a Git context when running in CI.

What are "orphaned Traces"?​

You might see a warning message in Dagger Cloud about orphaned Traces. Orphaned Traces are Traces emitted in a CI context, that contain incomplete or no Git metadata. This generally happens when Git is not properly set up in the CI context that Dagger runs in. In GitHub Actions, for example, this context can be provided by using the checkout action in the step where Dagger is called.

My CI provider is not supported in Dagger Cloud. Is there a way I can "force" my Traces into the Dagger Cloud dashboard?​

It’s possible to send Traces by setting the CI=true variable in Dagger's runtime environment. However, Traces with incomplete Git repository data will show up as orphaned, so it is important to ensure that Dagger is running in a properly-set Git context.

Dagger SDKs​

What language SDKs are available for Dagger?​

We currently offer a Go SDK, a TypeScript SDK and a Python SDK.

How do I log in to a container registry using a Dagger SDK?​

There are two options available:

  1. Use the Container.withRegistryAuth() GraphQL API method. A native equivalent of this method is available in each Dagger SDK.
  2. Dagger SDKs can use your existing Docker credentials without requiring separate authentication. Simply execute docker login against your container registry on the host where your Dagger pipelines are running.

How do I uninstall a Dagger SDK?​

To uninstall a Dagger SDK, follow the same procedure that you would follow to uninstall any other SDK package in your chosen development environment.

Dagger API​

What API query language does Dagger use?​

Dagger uses GraphQL as its low-level language-agnostic API query language.

Do I need to know GraphQL to use Dagger?​

No. You only need to know one of Dagger's supported SDKs languages to use Dagger. The translation to underlying GraphQL API calls is handled internally by the Dagger SDK of your choice.

There's no SDK for <language> yet. Can I still use Dagger?​

Yes. It's possible to use the Dagger GraphQL API from any language that supports GraphQL or from the Dagger CLI.