Fix Plugins Symlink in Dockerfile

[matthewzhaocc]

Currently, when you look into the docker image provided upstream, it creates /var/www/html/plugins/plugins instead of the correct /var/www/html/plugins folder symlinked to /pelican-data/plugins.

/var/www/html $ ls -alh /var/www/html/plugins/
total 12K    
drwxr-x---    1 root     www-data    4.0K Dec 19 23:44 .
drwxr-x---    1 root     www-data    4.0K Dec 19 23:44 ..
lrwxrwxrwx    1 root     root          21 Dec 19 23:44 plugins -> /pelican-data/plugins

[coderabbitai]

📝 Walkthrough

Walkthrough

Two Dockerfiles updated to replace the symbolic link creation command from ln -s to ln -sT for the plugins directory path. The -T flag alters how the linker handles pre-existing destination directories.

Changes

Cohort / File(s)	Summary
Symbolic Link Behavior Change Dockerfile, Dockerfile.dev	Modified symbolic link creation from ln -s to ln -sT for /pelican-data/plugins → /var/www/html/plugins. The -T flag treats the destination as a regular file rather than a directory, causing link creation to fail if the destination already exists as a directory instead of creating the link inside it.

Pre-merge checks

✅ Passed checks (3 passed)

Check name	Status	Explanation
Title check	✅ Passed	The title clearly and concisely describes the main change: fixing the plugins symlink creation in Dockerfile files.
Description check	✅ Passed	The description explains the problem (nested plugins directory/symlink structure) and the solution (using ln -sT), which aligns with the changeset modifications.
Docstring Coverage	✅ Passed	No functions found in the changed files to evaluate docstring coverage. Skipping docstring coverage check.

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📜 Recent review details

Configuration used: Repository UI

Review profile: CHILL

Plan: Pro

📥 Commits

Reviewing files that changed from the base of the PR and between 9af608f and e87dccf.

📒 Files selected for processing (2)

• Dockerfile
• Dockerfile.dev

🧰 Additional context used

🧠 Learnings (1)

📚 Learning: 2025-12-24T09:21:52.260Z

Learnt from: QuintenQVD0
Repo: pelican-dev/panel PR: 2034
File: Dockerfile.base:12-12
Timestamp: 2025-12-24T09:21:52.260Z
Learning: Ensure that Dockerfiles install git at runtime where required for plugin system dependency installation. Update Dockerfile.base and any other Dockerfiles that build runtime images to include git in the runtime dependencies (not just for build-time), so plugin installation steps function correctly in the container.

Applied to files:

• Dockerfile.dev

🔇 Additional comments (2)

Dockerfile.dev (1)

90-90: Verify that /var/www/html/plugins doesn't exist when this command runs.

Same concern as in Dockerfile: the -T flag prevents nested symlinks but will cause build failure if /var/www/html/plugins exists as a directory. Ensure the plugins directory is either:

• Excluded from COPY operations (lines 73-74)
• Removed before the symlink creation
• Or use ln -sfT to force replacement

The verification script provided for Dockerfile will confirm whether the plugins directory exists in the source code.

Dockerfile (1)

86-86: [No review comment provided]

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[github-actions]

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[matthewzhaocc]

I have read the CLA Document and I hereby sign the CLA

[parkervcp]

This wont work. You need to remove the plugins folder as was done in #2021

-T also treats it as a file and not a dir which may also be broken. I have validated this works fine with the T option