Is the provision container actually needed?

[FerranAD]

Hi! I am deploying BOPTEST locally to then use the gym interface and I see the following on the docker-compose.yml.

services:
  # A service to provision needed resources during development
  # The main task is to upload test cases
  # This is not a production container,
  # but the "boptest_submit" python module that is executed
  # by this service may be useful in provisioning a production environment
  provision:
    build: service/provision

But the instructions on the Boptest-gym repo say to run the following command:

docker compose up web worker provision

I ask since I would like to use the already built images offered for versions 0.7.1 and 0.8.0 at ghcr.io/ibpsa and I see there is none for the provision container, is it fine if I don't use it? What will I be missing? I don't fully understand what does "this service may be useful in provisioning a production environment" mean.

Thanks and congrats for the project!

[dhblum]

Hey! The easiest answer is yes you need it, as the provision container is the environment that loads the test case models into BOPTEST upon deployment, making them then available to select through the API in web and ultimately simulate in worker.

[FerranAD]

Thanks for the quick reply! I’ll use the provision container then.

May I ask why the provision image isn’t built and uploaded to the GitHub Container Registry along with the web and worker ones? It would help accelerate the setup by allowing the use of just a docker-compose.yml file without needing to clone the repo.