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Documentation Index

Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://tally.wharflab.com/llms.txt

Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

1

Install tally

Pick your preferred package manager:
brew install wharflab/tap/tally
See Installation for WinGet, RubyGems, Docker, and from-source options.
2

Lint a Dockerfile

Run tally against a single file or an entire directory (recursive):
# Single file
tally lint Dockerfile

# All Dockerfiles in the current repo
tally lint .
tally discovers files matching Dockerfile, Dockerfile.*, *.Dockerfile, Containerfile, and Containerfile.*.To make the same lint command available through Docker, register the Docker CLI plugin:
tally register-docker-plugin
docker lint Dockerfile
3

Lint a Bake or Compose entrypoint

If your build is defined by Docker Buildx Bake or Docker Compose, pass that file directly:
# Lint Bake targets from the default group
tally lint docker-bake.hcl

# Lint Compose services with build sections
tally lint compose.yaml
Use --target for Bake targets or groups and --service for Compose services:
tally lint docker-bake.hcl --target api
tally lint compose.yaml --service api
See Build invocations for context handling, output attribution, and limitations.
4

Read the output

By default tally prints human-readable output with source snippets:
WARNING: StageNameCasing - https://docs.docker.com/go/dockerfile/rule/stage-name-casing/
Stage name 'Builder' should be lowercase

Dockerfile:2
────────────────────
   1 │ FROM alpine
>>>2 │ FROM ubuntu AS Builder
   3 │ RUN echo "hello"
────────────────────
Exit code 1 means violations were found. Exit code 0 means clean.
5

Apply safe fixes

Many rules are auto-fixable. Apply all safe fixes with --fix:
tally lint --fix Dockerfile
--fix modifies files in place. Commit your changes before running it, or review the diff afterward.
6

Add a config file

Create .tally.toml in your project root to set defaults for your whole team:
.tally.toml
[output]
format = "text"
fail-level = "warning"

[rules]
include = ["buildkit/*", "tally/*", "hadolint/*"]
Config is discovered automatically — no --config flag needed.
7

Enable context-aware rules

In direct Dockerfile mode, pass --context to unlock rules that check .dockerignore interactions:
tally lint --context . Dockerfile
Bake and Compose entrypoints derive the build context from the selected target or service, so they do not use --context.
8

Suppress a violation inline

Use an inline directive to suppress a specific rule on the next line:
# tally ignore=StageNameCasing
FROM alpine AS Build
Add a reason to document why:
# tally ignore=DL3007;reason=Pinning at CI level via Renovate
FROM ubuntu:latest

​
Lint from stdin

Pass - as the filename to read from stdin. Useful in pipelines: 
cat Dockerfile | tally lint -
With --fix, the fixed content is written to stdout: 
cat Dockerfile | tally lint --fix - > Dockerfile.fixed

​
Next steps

Configuration

Full reference for .tally.toml, environment variables, and CLI flags.

Build invocations

Lint Dockerfiles through Bake targets and Compose services.

Auto-fix

Learn about safe and unsafe fixes, and per-rule fix modes.

Rules reference

Browse all rules across BuildKit, tally, Hadolint, and ShellCheck namespaces.

CI/CD integration

Add tally to GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, and other pipelines.