(amplify): Enable the possibility to configure buildImage

[desoss]

Currently in codebuild it's possible to configure in the section buildSpec the object environment and its property buildImage.

This property is ignored in an amplify hosting app.

Use Case

Codebuild, by default, uses a build image version that seems to be old.
Newer versions has many new dependencies installed.
What I'd like to configure is something like this:

        new amplify.App(this,  'test', {
            sourceCodeProvider: ...,
            buildSpec: codebuild.BuildSpec.fromObject({
                version: '1.0',
                frontend: {
                    ....
                    buildSpec: codebuild.BuildSpec.fromObject({
                        version: '1.0',
                        frontend: {
                           environment: {
                                buildImage: LinuxBuildImage.STANDARD_5_0,
                                privileged: true,
                                computeType: ComputeType.SMALL,
            ....
        },

The buildImage: LinuxBuildImage.STANDARD_5_0 has some dependecies missing in the current, default, old version, like jq (that seems to be exploited by many users in codebuild).

Proposed Solution

Please include buildSpec/environment/buildImage or a way to configure the image used by codebuild.

[fab-mindflow]

It looks like AWS::Amplify::App in CloudFormation has no custom build image property. If right, that means it is not even possible yet with Cfn constructs as a workaround.

[peterwoodworth]

I recommend creating an issue in Cloudformation coverage roadmap if you would like to see support for this feature

[dbartholomae]

I recently had a similar question, and there seems to be an environment variable called _CUSTOM_IMAGE that can be set in environmentVariables. There's a similar one for package updates called _LIVE_UPDATES that I'm using sucessfully.

[skinny85]

@dbartholomae is this something officially supported by Amplify, or is this a “hidden” feature that you managed to find? 🙂

[dbartholomae]

It's in the Amplify docs, if I remember correctly. There just aren't much details.

[modosc]

we just noticed this as well. we had custom "Build image settings" on our amplify app which was otherwise managed by cdk. we just updated an unrelated setting via cdk and it removed our build image settings.

we should be able to explicitly set these if cdk is going to silently overwrite them.