Volumes
Optional instance volumes
[Instance volumes](https://dstack.ai/docs/concepts/volumes/#instance-volumes) can now be made [`optional`](https://dstack.ai/docs/reference/dstack.yml/dev-environment/#instance-volumes). When a volume is marked as optional, it will be mounted only if the backend supports instance volumes; otherwise, it will not be mounted.
yaml
type: dev-environment
ide: vscode
volumes:
- instance_path: /dstack-cache
path: /root/.cache/
optional: true
Optional instance volumes are useful for caching, allowing runs to work with backends that don’t support them, such as `runpod`, `vastai`, and `kubernetes`.
Services
Path prefix
Previously, if you were running services without a gateway, it was not possible to deploy certain web apps, such as Dash. This was due to the path prefix `/proxy/services/<project name>/<run name>/` in the endpoint URL.
With this new update, it’s now possible to configure a service so that such web apps work without a gateway. To do this, set the [`strip_prefix`](https://dstack.ai/docs/reference/dstack.yml/service/#strip_prefix) property to `false` and pass the prefix to the web app. Here’s an example with a Dash app:
yaml
type: service
name: my-dash-app
gateway: false
Disable authorization
auth: false
Do not strip the path prefix
strip_prefix: false
env:
Configure Dash to work with a path prefix
- DASH_ROUTES_PATHNAME_PREFIX=/proxy/services/main/my-dash-app/
commands:
- pip install dash
- python app.py
port: 8050
Git
Branches
When you run `dstack apply`, before `dstack` starts a container, it fetches the code from the repository where `dstack apply` was invoked. If the repository is a remote Git repo, `dstack` clones it using the user’s Git credentials.
Previously, `dstack` always cloned only a single branch in this scenario (to ensure faster startup).
With this update, for development environments, `dstack` now clones all branches by default. You can override this behavior using the new [`single_branch`](https://dstack.ai/docs/reference/dstack.yml/dev-environment/#single_branch) property.
SSH
If you override the [`user`](https://dstack.ai/docs/reference/dstack.yml/dev-environment/#user) property in your run configuration, `dstack` runs the container as that user. Previously, when accessing the dev environment via VS Code or connecting to the run with the `ssh <run name>` command, you were still logged in as the root user and had to switch manually. Now, you are automatically logged in as the configured user.
What's changed
* Update contributing guide on runs and jobs by r4victor in https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/pull/2247
* Remove no offers warnings for SSH fleets by jvstme in https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/pull/2249
* Allow configuring single_branch by r4victor in https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/pull/2256
* Fix SSH fleet and gateway configuration change detection by r4victor in https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/pull/2258
* Update contributing guide on shim by un-def in https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/pull/2255
* Configuring if service path prefix is stripped by jvstme in https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/pull/2254
* [`dstack-runner`] Back up and restore `~/.ssh` files by un-def in https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/pull/2261
* Use `user` property as the default user for SSH by un-def in https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/pull/2263
* Support optional instance volumes by jvstme in https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/pull/2260
* Extend request/response logging by jvstme in https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/pull/2265
**Full changelog**: https://github.com/dstackai/dstack/compare/0.18.39...0.18.40