Docker compose bind mount with colon & comma in path not working

Docker Engine Compose
1

I have mounted my google drive folder in Ubuntu using gnome-online-accounts, which ends up being mounted like so:

/run/user/1000/gvfs/google-drive:host=my_host.com,user=my.username

Mounting this in a docker container works fine if I escape it correctly, i.e.:

--mount "type=bind,\"source=/run/user/1000/gvfs/google-drive:host=my_host.com,user=my.username/\",target=/data/gdrive"

If I try to do the same with docker compose, however, it breaks:

# docker-compose.yml

services:
  myservice:
    build:
      context: .
      dockerfile: Dockerfile
    volumes:
      - type: bind
        source: "\"/run/user/1000/gvfs/google-drive:host=my_host.com,user=my.username/\""
        target: /data/gdrive

I get the error:

Error response from daemon: invalid volume specification: '/home/me/my_project/"/run/user/1000/gvfs/google-drive:host=my_host.com,user=my.username/":/data/gdrive:rw'

What confuses me even more is that it somehow prefixes the mount with the path to the project I’m working in…

I’ve also tried not escaping it:

source: /run/user/1000/gvfs/google-drive:host=my_host.com,user=my.username/

and escaping it with source: | and source: >:

source: |
  /run/user/1000/gvfs/google-drive:host=my_host.com,user=my.username/

but to no avail…

2

Have your tries quoting the whole path with single quotes?

I remember we had a topic with a length discussion about paths with colons, it think it was about drive serial numbers. You could check the forum search.

Worst case: create a bind on the folder (something like this: mount --bind '/run/user/1000/gvfs/google-drive:host=my_host.com,user=my.username/' /mnt/gdrive) and then bind /mnt/grdive into the container.

3

Yes, I’ve tried quoting about every way I could think of. Unless I’ve missed the one option it doesn’t seem to work.

Worst case: create a bind on the folder […]

That’s pretty much what I’ve settled on in the meantime, I first create a dedicated volume:

docker volume create \
  --driver local \
  -o o=bind \
  -o type=none \
  -o device="/run/user/1000/gvfs/google-drive:host=my_host.com,user=my.username/" \
  gdrive

Then in the docker compose I bind it as normal:

services:
my_service:
  ...
  volumes:
     - gdrive:/data/gdrive

volumes:
  gdrive:
    external: true

Bit annoying, but at least it’s workable for now…

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4

Your solution is better than what I have proposed :slight_smile:

You could create the named volume backed by a bind in the compose file as well:

volumes:
  gdrive:
    driver: local
    driver_opts:
      type: none
      o: bind
      device: "/run/user/1000/gvfs/google-drive:host=my_host.com,user=my.username/"

Just keep in mind that volume are immutable, so that updates on the compose file will not be reflected back to the configuration of the volume, unless it’s manually removed.

1 Like
5

Oh nice, thanks! I’ve used docker for years, but never had to get into that much detail on volumes… TIL :smiley:

1 Like