Support testing with Firefox in air-gapped environment (Docker)

[MikeMcC399]

What would you like?

Give the cypress/factory Cypress Docker image, and associated process, the ability to generate other Cypress Docker images that do not require an Internet connection when testing against Firefox.

In an air-gapped environment, testing against Firefox:

• Allow custom images, built from cypress/factory, cypress/base or cypress/browsers to test successfully.

• Allow cypress/included images to test successfully out of the box.

Why is this needed?

• Some users require to test in an air-gapped network (meaning no connection to any external networks or cloud resources).

• Since the release [email protected], Cypress consumes the geckodriver to help automate the Firefox browser instead of the cypress-io/marionette-client.

• If an attempt is made to run Cypress from a Docker image with Firefox, and there is no Internet connection, then Firefox fails to run, with an error message

  FetchError: request to https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mozilla/geckodriver/release/Cargo.toml failed, reason: getaddrinfo ENOTFOUND raw.githubusercontent.com

Other

• A driver package mozilla/geckodriver, current release v0.36.0, is sourced on mozilla/geckodriver

• An npm wrapper package geckodriver, current release v5.0.0, is sourced on webdriverio-community/node-geckodriver, provides a wrapper to aid in downloading the mozilla/geckodriver

Steps to reproduce

With Internet connection

docker pull cypress/included:latest
git clone https://github.com/cypress-io/cypress-docker-images
cd cypress-docker-images
cd examples/basic-mini

Disconnect network and attempt to execute, testing against Firefox, which fails trying to download a missing driver:

docker run -it --rm -v .:/app -w /app --entrypoint cypress cypress/included run -b firefox

Logs

$ docker run -it --rm -v .:/app -w /app --entrypoint cypress cypress/included run -b firefox


DevTools listening on ws://127.0.0.1:43731/devtools/browser/69952a44-27ba-4382-a915-71bd5a5eb6ad

====================================================================================================

  (Run Starting)

  ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
  │ Cypress:        14.3.3                                                                         │
  │ Browser:        Firefox 138 (headless)                                                         │
  │ Node Version:   v22.15.0 (/usr/local/bin/node)                                                 │
  │ Specs:          1 found (spec.cy.js)                                                           │
  │ Searched:       cypress/e2e/**/*.cy.{js,jsx,ts,tsx}                                            │
  └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘


────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

  Running:  spec.cy.js                                                                      (1 of 1)
Cypress failed to make a connection to Firefox.

This usually indicates there was a problem opening the Firefox browser.

FetchError: request to https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mozilla/geckodriver/release/Cargo.toml failed, reason: getaddrinfo ENOTFOUND raw.githubusercontent.com
    at ClientRequest.<anonymous> (file:///root/.cache/Cypress/14.3.3/Cypress/resources/app/packages/server/node_modules/node-fetch/src/index.js:108:11)
    at ClientRequest.emit (node:events:518:28)
    at emitErrorEvent (node:_http_client:101:11)
    at TLSSocket.socketErrorListener (node:_http_client:504:5)
    at TLSSocket.emit (node:events:518:28)
    at emitErrorNT (node:internal/streams/destroy:169:8)
    at emitErrorCloseNT (node:internal/streams/destroy:128:3)
    at process.processTicksAndRejections (node:internal/process/task_queues:82:21)

[MikeMcC399]

Related issues

• Cypress tests fail in air-gapped network on Firefox #1298
• Custom firefox image doesn't work anymore #1339
• Cypress with firefox in an air-gapped environment #1346

[MikeMcC399]

Breaking change Cypress 13.15.1

The requirement for an Internet connection was introduced by [email protected]. For air-gapped users of Cypress Docker images, this was a breaking change.

Running the steps to reproduce with the version [email protected], before the migration to geckodriver, succeeds to test with Firefox.

Connected to Internet:

docker pull cypress/included:13.15.0

then disconnected from Internet:

docker run -it --rm -v .:/app -w /app --entrypoint cypress cypress/included:13.15.0 run -b firefox # succeeds

[MikeMcC399]

Assessment

GECKODRIVER_AUTO_INSTALL

According to geckodriver > README > Installing, the environment variable setting GECKODRIVER_AUTO_INSTALL=1 can be used to install the driver together with npm dependencies.

This does not immediately apply to the cypress npm package, because the geckodriver is not a dependency of the npm package (view on https://www.npmjs.com/package/cypress?activeTab=code), instead the driver wrapper geckodriver is bundled into the Cypress binary through https://github.com/cypress-io/cypress/blob/develop/packages/server/package.json

GECKODRIVER_PATH

geckodriver > README > Options > customGeckoDriverPath lists

customGeckoDriverPath

Don't download Geckodriver, instead use a custom path to it, e.g. a cached binary.

Type: string
Default: process.env.GECKODRIVER_PATH

Proof of Concept

Using GECKODRIVER_PATH

git clone https://github.com/cypress-io/cypress-docker-images
cd cypress-docker-images
cd examples/basic
cp Dockerfile.browsers Dockerfile.firefox-geckodriver
npm ci

Edit Dockerfile.firefox-geckodriver and add the following to the end of the file:

RUN wget -O /tmp/geckodriver.tar.gz \
https://github.com/mozilla/geckodriver/releases/download/v0.36.0/geckodriver-v0.36.0-linux64.tar.gz
RUN tar -C /opt -xaf /tmp/geckodriver.tar.gz
RUN rm /tmp/geckodriver.tar.gz
ENV GECKODRIVER_PATH=/opt/geckodriver

Execute build command with Internet connection:

docker build --progress plain -f Dockerfile.firefox-geckodriver -t test-firefox-geckodriver .

Disconnect network and execute:

docker run -it --rm --entrypoint bash test-firefox-geckodriver -c "npx cypress run -b firefox"

Firefox runs successfully.

Recommendation

Further research if installing a geckodriver together with Firefox can be integrated into the Factory build process.