TailwindCSS Standalone CLI not working in Alpine Linux (docker)

[altdsoy]

The tailwindcss binary release is not working on Alpine Linux.
Tested with the release tailwindcss-linux-x64 v3.0.7 on the latest docker alpine image.

If I run an alpine container (installing curl, and downloading the standalone release as described here https://tailwindcss.com/blog/standalone-cli#get-started ) I got nothing (binary not found).
Running the exact same steps in debian works.

Tell me if I need to provide more information.

Example steps to reproduce it:

#On the host
docker run -it --rm alpine ash

#Within the container
apk add curl
curl -sLO https://github.com/tailwindlabs/tailwindcss/releases/latest/download/tailwindcss-linux-x64
chmod +x tailwindcss-linux-x64
mv tailwindcss-linux-x64 tailwindcss
./tailwindcss init
# Got => ./tailwindcss: not found

The exact same steps works fine using debian for example:

#On the host
docker run -it --rm debian bash

#Within the container
apt update
apt install curl # Type Y to install
curl -sLO https://github.com/tailwindlabs/tailwindcss/releases/latest/download/tailwindcss-linux-x64
chmod +x tailwindcss-linux-x64
mv tailwindcss-linux-x64 tailwindcss
./tailwindcss init
# Generate tailwind.config.js

Edit:
Here is the output of file:

tailwindcss: ELF 64-bit LSB executable, x86-64, version 1 (GNU/Linux), dynamically linked, interpreter /lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2, BuildID[sha1]=2e882d60273a4031f72a88815a36cb574dc1090b, for GNU/Linux 2.6.32, stripped

Seems I need to install some libraries...

Edit 2:
This answer from SO seems relevant to the issue: https://stackoverflow.com/a/66974607

Executables built on glibc distributions depend on /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libc.so.6, for example, which is not available on Alpine (unless, they are statically linked).

So is it possible to statically link dependencies when compiling the binaries?

Edit 3:
Some workarounds are based on installing gcompat and/or libc6-compat, but those do not fix the tailwindcss issue.

Edit 4:
I just noticed that the standalone CLI is using a tool called pkg under the hood.

So maybe this issue does not belong here..
If so, feel free to close.

Edit 5: As stated below, installing both gcompat and build-base solves the problem.

[DistantMe]

@altdsoy I use Alpine (3.15) in a VM and the standalone binary works if I install gcompat, but I've tested in Docker and I can confirm your findings. Installing gcompat and libstdc++ gets me closer with less errors, but it still doesn't run.

[altdsoy]

Installing gcompat and libstdc++ gets me closer with less errors, but it still doesn't run.

@DistantMe I also noticed the same thing but still didn't find a solution. I wonder if it is possible to solve this in the Tailwind side, or does it need to be solved on the pkg side or even on the Alpine side?

[mveytsman]

@DistantMe does adding gcompat and build-base work for you?

I agree it would be great if tailwind could build this binary statically linked - I see the pkg docs say:

Note that fully static Node binaries are not capable of loading native bindings, so you may not use Node bindings with linuxstatic.

Not sure if this would affect this project?

[DistantMe]

@DistantMe does adding gcompat and build-base work for you?

@mveytsman adding build-base did the trick, works perfectly after adding that (and gcompat) 😁 I didn't need libstdc++ by the looks of it.

@altdsoy, after taking the above into account, I ran the following as a test:

On Docker host: docker run -it --rm alpine ash

Inside Docker container:
apk add gcompat build-base
wget https://github.com/tailwindlabs/tailwindcss/releases/latest/download/tailwindcss-linux-x64
chmod +x tailwindcss-linux-x64
./tailwindcss-linux-x64

... and the general help screen is displayed correctly.

[altdsoy]

@DistantMe, Indeed, as also stated by @mveytsman, for me gcompat and build-base solves the problem too!

I tried many different libraries (but rather in a random way).. I should have tried in a better way those two one together..
Anyway, thank you very much for your inputs..
Closing the issue..

[mveytsman]

I added a suggestion to switch to static builds here: #6785

[joshdoesthis]

Ran into the same issue with Alpine 3.20. Adding gcompat and build-base (as per above recommendations) has made tailwindcss-linux-arm64 work as expected.

FROM alpine:3.20
RUN apk add --no-cache curl gcompat build-base
RUN curl -sLO https://github.com/tailwindlabs/tailwindcss/releases/download/v3.4.4/tailwindcss-linux-arm64
RUN chmod +x tailwindcss-linux-arm64
RUN mv tailwindcss-linux-arm64 tailwindcss
ENTRYPOINT ["./tailwindcss"]