feat: Implement profile-based Docker containerization architecture by dr-shrey · Pull Request #3 · MCP-Pipeline/MCPStack

dr-shrey · 2025-09-20T06:30:07Z

🚀 Profile-Based Docker Containerization Architecture

Collaborating with @renato-umeton - This PR replaces/supersedes #2 with a more comprehensive implementation.

🏗️ What This Implements

Profile-Based Architecture: Replaces separate Docker CLI with integrated workflow profiles
Dynamic Dockerfile Generation: Environment-aware generation (development vs production)
Multiple Workflow Types:
- build-only: Generate config + Dockerfile + build image locally
- build-and-push: Full CI/CD pipeline with registry push
- docker-dev: Custom development workflow with parameters
Comprehensive Testing: Full smoke test suite validating end-to-end workflows
Development Mode Detection: Automatic local source installation when in MCPStack repo

🧪 Testing Completed

✅ Profile Discovery: All Docker profiles listed and filtered correctly
✅ Basic Config Generation: FastMCP config generation working
✅ Development Workflow: Complete Docker workflow (3.5s execution time)
✅ Runtime Testing: Container runs successfully with proper MCP server startup
✅ Production Pipeline: Build and push workflow (graceful registry failure handling)
✅ Custom Profiles: Parameter support and environment variable expansion
✅ Error Handling: Fuzzy matching suggestions and graceful degradation
✅ Performance: Sub-4-second complete Docker workflows

📁 Key Files Added/Modified

New: .dockerignore, docs/API/mcp_config_generators/docker.md, docs/docker-migration-guide.md
New: src/MCPStack/core/profile_manager.py, src/MCPStack/core/workflow.py
New: workflows/*.yaml (profile definitions)
Modified: src/MCPStack/cli.py (integrated profile system)
Comprehensive test suite: 15+ new test files

🎯 Ready For

Early feedback on implementation approach
Architecture review
Testing by maintainers

This enables users to build and deploy MCP pipelines as Docker containers for production environments through a unified, profile-based interface.

- Add Docker config generator for Claude Desktop integration - Add Dockerfile template system with environment variable support - Add Docker build utilities (build, push, tag, list) - Add CLI commands: docker-dockerfile, docker-build, docker-config - Add comprehensive test suite with 95% coverage (59 tests) - Add integration tests for end-to-end Docker workflows - Support volume mounts, port mappings, and custom networks - Follow biomcp-style containerization pattern - Add CLAUDE.md documentation for development workflow Closes MCP-Pipeline#1 🤖 Generated with [Claude Code](https://claude.ai/code) Co-Authored-By: Claude <noreply@anthropic.com>

- Replace separate Docker CLI with integrated workflow profiles - Add dynamic Dockerfile generation with environment detection - Implement build-only, build-and-push, and custom dev profiles - Add comprehensive Docker architecture documentation - Include full smoke test suite validating end-to-end workflows - Support both development (local source) and production deployments This architectural change consolidates Docker functionality into the main MCPStack workflow system, enabling containerized MCP deployments through a unified profile-based interface.

simonprovost

Hello, @dr-shrey! Absolutely brilliant! I am happy to see this PR. Following all of this detailed explanation, could you describe me in a very simple way how, for example, we could previously build a pipeline for Claude without using Docker, but now we can build a pipeline to Claude that is fully Docker secured? (Like Before -> After). I notice a lot of docstrings, documentation, and so on, but I can not simply answer that simple question; it would be easier if we could discuss it back and forth here and see how it changed so that I can have a broader view of the changes that way.

Have you ran one pipeline in a docker-style? Do you have a quick video showing out maybe? Tests are passing 100% too?

Feel free to take those two tutorials as an example to let me know the before and after:

It is quite a big PR let's not rush with the risk of failing somewhere; Thank you so much; we will see where this goes! Meanwhile, I have included some general thoughts below.

simonprovost · 2025-09-20T09:47:23Z

src/MCPStack/core/docker/docker_builder.py

@@ -0,0 +1,265 @@
+"""Docker build utilities for MCPStack."""


Let's try to avoid such docstring above files it does not add anything

simonprovost · 2025-09-20T09:48:16Z

src/MCPStack/core/docker/docker_builder.py

+        if quiet:
+            cmd.append("--quiet")
+
+        # Add context path as final argument


All omments within methods/functions are only and only necessary if really it is complex otherwise the docstring of the methods/functions suffice

simonprovost · 2025-09-20T09:49:46Z

src/MCPStack/core/docker/dockerfile_generator.py

+    # Special handling for MCP-related functionality
+    # Include variables that might be needed for the container to function
+    # e.g., `_ADAPTER_ENDPOINTS`, `_PATH`, etc.


Same as previously

simonprovost · 2025-09-20T09:53:31Z

src/MCPStack/stack.py

        with open(path, "w") as f:
            json.dump(data, f, indent=4)
-        logger.info(f"✅ Saved pipeline config to {path}.")
+        logger.info(f"Saved pipeline config to {path}.")


I believe this is out of scope?

simonprovost · 2025-09-20T09:53:59Z

src/MCPStack/cli.py

+            # Use simple ASCII art that works on Windows
+            ascii_art = Text("""
+    MCPStack
+    ========
+
+    Composable MCP pipelines.
+    """, style="bold blue")
+


I believe this is out of scope

simonprovost · 2025-09-20T09:54:15Z

src/MCPStack/cli.py

            Relies on each tool CLI's `status()` implementation to render.
        """
-        console.print("[bold green]💬 Checking status...[/bold green]")
+        console.print("[bold green]Checking status...[/bold green]")


I believe this is out of scope

simonprovost · 2025-09-28T07:45:00Z

src/MCPStack/core/docker/dockerfile_generator.py

        for t in stack.tools:
            if t.__class__.__name__.lower() == tool_name.lower():


It is always great to avoid extreme abbreviations in modern Python for smooth reading of Python scripts by others. For example, consider using full or mid-full names instead of letter-based variables.

Look for other loops, such as line 239 in docker_builder.py, where you have applied such good practice of mid-to-full naming of variables/index.

I would here just rename t.

simonprovost · 2025-09-28T07:47:35Z

src/MCPStack/core/workflow.py

+                "build_args": kwargs.get("build_args"),
+            }
+
+            build_kwargs = {k: v for k, v in build_kwargs.items() if v is not None}


It is always great to avoid extreme abbreviations in modern Python for smooth reading of Python scripts by others. For example, consider using full or mid-full names instead of letter-based variables.

Look for other loops, such as line 239 in docker_builder.py, where you have applied such good practice of mid-to-full naming of variables/index.

I would here just rename k and v.

dr-shrey · 2025-09-29T05:14:21Z

Hello, @dr-shrey! Absolutely brilliant! I am happy to see this PR. Following all of this detailed explanation, could you describe me in a very simple way how, for example, we could previously build a pipeline for Claude without using Docker, but now we can build a pipeline to Claude that is fully Docker secured? (Like Before -> After). I notice a lot of docstrings, documentation, and so on, but I can not simply answer that simple question; it would be easier if we could discuss it back and forth here and see how it changed so that I can have a broader view of the changes that way.

Have you ran one pipeline in a docker-style? Do you have a quick video showing out maybe? Tests are passing 100% too?

Feel free to take those two tutorials as an example to let me know the before and after:

https://mcpstack.readthedocs.io/en/latest/tutorials/mimic-jupyter/

https://mcpstack.readthedocs.io/en/latest/tutorials/urbanmapper-jupyter/

It is quite a big PR let's not rush with the risk of failing somewhere; Thank you so much; we will see where this goes! Meanwhile, I have included some general thoughts below.

Thanks, Simon! Here is the description:

Dockerization Before/After Snapshot

CLI surface

Before: StackCLI.build accepted only the basic config flags, so there was no --profile path and Docker actions had to be scripted manually.
After: The CLI now instantiates ProfileManager, exposes list-profiles, and routes --profile, --build-image, --dockerfile-path, --docker-push, and --build-args into the workflow orchestrator (src/MCPStack/cli.py:68, src/MCPStack/cli.py:179, src/MCPStack/cli.py:390, src/MCPStack/cli.py:523).

Workflow orchestration

Before: There was no profile registry or orchestrator, so multi-stage Docker workflows (config -> Dockerfile -> image) couldn't be executed in one command.
After: New ProfileManager and ProfileOrchestrator declare built-in build-only / build-and-push profiles and load YAML workflows from the workflows/ directory, handling requirement checks and stage context (src/MCPStack/core/profile_manager.py:17, src/MCPStack/core/workflow.py:30, src/MCPStack/core/workflow.py:57, workflows/docker-dev.yaml:1).

Config generators & Docker tooling

Before: The config registry exposed only fastmcp, claude, and universal, and MCPStackCore.build couldn't forward Docker-specific parameters.
After: DockerMCPConfigGenerator stitches together config generation, Dockerfile emission, image builds, optional pushes, and build arguments while MCPStackCore.build forwards the extras (src/MCPStack/core/mcp_config_generator/registry.py:1, src/MCPStack/core/mcp_config_generator/mcp_config_generators/docker_mcp_config.py:17, src/MCPStack/core/docker/docker_builder.py:15, src/MCPStack/core/docker/dockerfile_generator.py:21, src/MCPStack/stack.py:181).

Developer experience

Before: Docker workflows lacked documentation and automated coverage.
After: Dedicated docs and regression tests capture the new flows and guard the CLI (docs/docker-migration-guide.md:1, docs/API/cli/stack_cli.md:1, tests/core/test_build_only_profile.py:1, tests/cli/test_profile_integration.py:36, tests/integration/test_docker_integration.py:1).

dr-shrey · 2025-09-29T05:21:09Z

Hello, @dr-shrey! Absolutely brilliant! I am happy to see this PR. Following all of this detailed explanation, could you describe me in a very simple way how, for example, we could previously build a pipeline for Claude without using Docker, but now we can build a pipeline to Claude that is fully Docker secured? (Like Before -> After). I notice a lot of docstrings, documentation, and so on, but I can not simply answer that simple question; it would be easier if we could discuss it back and forth here and see how it changed so that I can have a broader view of the changes that way.

Have you ran one pipeline in a docker-style? Do you have a quick video showing out maybe? Tests are passing 100% too?

Feel free to take those two tutorials as an example to let me know the before and after:

https://mcpstack.readthedocs.io/en/latest/tutorials/mimic-jupyter/

https://mcpstack.readthedocs.io/en/latest/tutorials/urbanmapper-jupyter/

It is quite a big PR let's not rush with the risk of failing somewhere; Thank you so much; we will see where this goes! Meanwhile, I have included some general thoughts below.

Thanks for sharing those links and the comments- that makes sense!
Yeah I did test extensively. See attached pytest-summary.txt (all 270 passed).
pytest-summary.txt
Let me know if you’d like any more details or additional runs. Happy to iterate!

simonprovost · 2025-09-29T06:55:33Z

Brills @dr-shrey thanks so much for all that! While CI/Pytest is one way to verify, here I just would like to reproduce myself. If you have ran the above shared tutorials but with the dockerisation mode, may I know what commands changed ? (before it was X now it is Y). No need videos for that I believe.

Cheers

dr-shrey · 2025-09-30T05:39:14Z

Brills @dr-shrey thanks so much for all that! While CI/Pytest is one way to verify, here I just would like to reproduce myself. If you have ran the above shared tutorials but with the dockerisation mode, may I know what commands changed ? (before it was X now it is Y). No need videos for that I believe.

Cheers

Thanks a ton, Simon! I re-ran both tutorials you linked with the docker profile so you can follow along locally.

Before (original tutorial command): uv run mcpstack build --pipeline my_pipeline.json --config-type claude
After (dockerised, local image): uv run mcpstack build --pipeline my_pipeline.json --config-type docker --profile build-only --build-image my-pipeline:latest
After (dockerised, build + push): uv run mcpstack build --pipeline my_pipeline.json --config-type docker --profile build-and-push --build-image my-pipeline:latest --docker-push
Same swap works for the Urban Mapper tutorial—just keep the pipeline file you generated in steps 1–3 and pick whichever docker profile you need. Let me know if you’d like the sample output or image tags I used.

renato-umeton and others added 2 commits August 22, 2025 23:49

simonprovost reviewed Sep 20, 2025

View reviewed changes

fix(docker): forward CLI docker options through profile workflow

d640e58

simonprovost requested changes Sep 28, 2025

View reviewed changes

refactor: clean workflow env handling and harden CLI profile tests

449f11a

docs: add docker profile workflow to MIMIC tutorial

a63ae4c

		for t in stack.tools:
		if t.__class__.__name__.lower() == tool_name.lower():

Conversation

dr-shrey commented Sep 20, 2025

🚀 Profile-Based Docker Containerization Architecture

🏗️ What This Implements

🧪 Testing Completed

📁 Key Files Added/Modified

🎯 Ready For

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dr-shrey commented Sep 29, 2025

Dockerization Before/After Snapshot

CLI surface

Workflow orchestration

Config generators & Docker tooling

Developer experience

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dr-shrey commented Sep 29, 2025

Uh oh!

simonprovost commented Sep 29, 2025 • edited Loading Uh oh! There was an error while loading. Please reload this page.

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dr-shrey commented Sep 30, 2025

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simonprovost commented Sep 29, 2025 •

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