mkdir is not executing in Dockerfile/build

Question

There is already a question, with answer, under a similar title, but the title isn't really outlining the true question. mkdir is in fact executing for the other question/thread. It is just failing...

Whereas I've:

RUN mkdir -p /home/developer And I get: Step 18 : RUN MKDIR Unknown instruction: RUN MKDIR

That is ACTUALLY not executing.

Here is the Docker file from line 1. All of these steps succeed, until mkdir.

FROM ubuntu:14.04
ENV DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
RUN apt-get -y purge php.*
RUN apt-get update
RUN apt-get upgrade -y
RUN apt-get install -y wget
RUN apt-get install -y build-essential
RUN wget http://xmlsoft.org/sources/libxml2-2.8.0.tar.gz
RUN tar -xvf libxml2-2.8.0.tar.gz
WORKDIR libxml2-2.8.0
RUN ./configure && make && make install
RUN apt-get install -y make
# build php
RUN wget http://museum.php.net/php5/php-5.4.0.tar.bz2
RUN tar -xvf php-5.4.0.tar.bz2
WORKDIR php-5.4.0
RUN ./configure && make
RUN make install
# Replace 1000 with your user / group id
RUN export uid=1000 gid=1000
# −p, −−parents -> no error if existing, make parent directories as needed
RUN mkdir -p /home/developer

Menial

Answer 1

There's an interesting character between RUN and mkdir in your Dockerfile. Replacing it with a space makes your Dockerfile build.

docker build output with yours:

Sending build context to Docker daemon 2.048 kB
Step 1 : FROM ubuntu:14.04
 ---> c4bea91afef3
Step 2 : RUN MKDIR
Unknown instruction: RUN MKDIR

docker build output with fixed:

Sending build context to Docker daemon 2.048 kB
Step 1 : FROM ubuntu:14.04
 ---> c4bea91afef3
Step 2 : RUN mkdir -p /home/developer
 ---> Using cache
 ---> 1ac57f7c9ccd
Successfully built 1ac57f7c9ccd

Salary

>>> And you found that via hexmode/xxd in vim. <<< I can't thank you enough. I'm embarrased to say how many hours I've been stuck on this mystery! More on that: vim.wikia.com/wiki/Improved_hex_editing – Menial

Was it a tab? What version of docker are you using? I think it would make sense to make the builder accept both "tabs" and "spaces" instead of erroring out. – Foothold

No, it was from working in Windows at some point, and then back in Linux the char seems to have been added by editing in Windows. – Menial

The problem is mkdir MUST be in lowercase. – Veloz

Answer 2

mkdir should be lowercase. I received "MKDIR: not found" when using uppercase MKDIR.

Faso