Cache management for ARG command with multi-config build

[Wayofthesin]

I would like to have multi-configuration build with all of the configuration pushed to the top as follows (the following is pretty much standard layer setup for my daily work with Docker):

# This variable is meant for configuration selection.
# Supported values are `prod` and `dev`
ARG ENV

# Here is the actual configuration - separate for prod and dev
ARG EXEC_APT_DEPS_prod=""
ARG EXEC_APT_DEPS_dev="${EXEC_APT_DEPS_prod} linux-perf gdb gdbserver"

ARG BUILD_APT_DEPS_prod="automake ccache make build-essential pkg-config"
ARG BUILD_APT_DEPS_dev="${BUILD_APT_DEPS_prod} gdb libpcre3-dbg"

FROM debian AS config_prod

    ARG EXEC_APT_DEPS_prod
    ARG BUILD_APT_DEPS_prod

    ARG EXEC_APT_DEPS=${EXEC_APT_DEPS_prod}
    ARG BUILD_APT_DEPS=${BUILD_APT_DEPS_prod}

FROM debian AS config_dev

    ARG EXEC_APT_DEPS_dev
    ARG BUILD_APT_DEPS_dev

    
    ARG EXEC_APT_DEPS=${EXEC_APT_DEPS_dev}
    ARG BUILD_APT_DEPS=${BUILD_APT_DEPS_dev}

# Note how the previous layer is selected dynamically here
FROM config_${ENV} AS exec_base

    RUN DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive && \
        apt-get update && \
        apt-get install --no-install-recommends -y && \
        eatmydata apt-get full-upgrade -y ${EXEC_APT_DEPS} && \
        apt-get clean && \
        rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists /usr/share/locale /usr/share/doc

# Note: Build base is based on the exec base
#           So every exec dependency is also build dependency
FROM exec_base AS build_base

    RUN DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive && \
        apt-get update && \
        apt-get install --no-install-recommends -y && \
        eatmydata apt-get full-upgrade -y ${BUILD_APT_DEPS} && \
        apt-get clean && \
        rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists /usr/share/locale /usr/share/doc

    RUN autogen

FROM exec_base AS install

    RUN make

FROM exec_base AS install

    COPY --from build /my_built_app /bin/my_built_app

The docker documentation states that:

If a Dockerfile defines an ARG variable whose value is different from a previous build, then a “cache miss” occurs upon its first usage, not its definition.

Given this I would expect that change of the BUILD_APT_DEPS_dev ARG would only invalidate the build_base layer but it's not what I am observing. Upon change of the mentioned ARG the whole cache is invalidated and the image is rebuilt. Is it intended behavior?

I am aware of the pattern where different configuration is kept in separate files but I find it more complex than single file configuration. When copying across different layers it might require specific build order and you might unintentionally work with old data without any notification. I would like to focus on ARG cache handling on this topic so please keep it out of the discussion.