How a Silent Docker Cache Bug Shipped Stale Code Without Any Errors
A software developer discovered that a Docker build silently served a day-old compiled artifact despite new source code being present, with no errors raised during the process. The issue stemmed from Docker's layer cache, where a COPY --from=builder instruction pulled a previous build's output even though the source had changed. To counter this, the developer built a post-build verification step that compared compiled artifacts inside the image against expected source hashes. However, the check only covered three hand-picked modules out of 65, and when a release modified a different module, the check passed with an 'OK' that was technically accurate but practically misleading. The incident highlights a deeper flaw: the verification system never validated its own core assumption that cache staleness always affects an entire layer rather than individual modules.
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