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Allow snapcraft to use remote lxd instances.

View original Github issue

Metadata

Project
snapcraft
Number
#4454
Type
issue
State
open
Author
jat-canonical
Labels
Status: Triaged Type: Enhancement
Created
Updated
Closed
—

Current evaluation

Feature request to let snapcraft build against a remote LXD instance (via lxc remote config) instead of requiring a local LXD install, enabling snap development on macOS/Windows. Triaged and tracked in Jira (CRAFT-2554); follow-up discussion moved to craft-providers#508, which remains open.

Suggested action: keep open

Reason: The issue is labelled Status: Triaged and Type: Enhancement, and a maintainer (mr-cal) explicitly redirected the discussion to craft-providers#508 (2024-02-27), where remote LXD cluster support is acknowledged as partially implemented but still needing UX and cross-architecture work. The linked craft-providers issue is still open, so this remains a valid, actively-tracked enhancement rather than a stale or resolved item.

Impact: 60 Quick Win: 18.0 Staleness: 55 Complexity: 70 Confidence: 70 Support Request: 10

Issue body

### What needs to get done Since snap builds only require a linux system container (LXD Container), could we look into making use of a remote LXD instance and relying on locally configured `lxc` configuration to reach out to the LXD instance to build snaps? ### Why it needs to get done I use a mac for my local development and run a remote lxd instance which can be reached using `lxc` to interact with the instance. Currently snapcraft looks for a local installation of lxd which is not possible on a mac. My current workaround is to to have dedicated linux vm for building snaps, have my local directory mounted in the vm and always login to the instance first to start building the snap. This might prove useful for any user not running linux as a daily driver host os but trying to develop snaps.

Evaluation history

Date Model Scores Action Summary
qwen/qwen3.8-27b
Impact: 60
Quick Win: 18.0
Staleness: 55
Complexity: 70
Confidence: 70
Support Request: 10
keep open Feature request to let snapcraft build against a remote LXD instance (via lxc remote config) instead of requiring a local LXD install, enabling snap development on macOS/Windows. Triaged and tracked in Jira (CRAFT-2554); follow-up discussion moved to craft-providers#508, which remains open.
qwen/qwen3.6-35b-a3b
Staleness: 90
Complexity: 60
Confidence: 80
Support Request: 10
keep open Enhancement to support remote LXD instances for snap builds, enabling non-Linux hosts. Triaged and referenced in craft-providers #508, currently inactive for over a year.
qwen3.6-35b-a3b-mtp-q6
Staleness: 85
Complexity: 55
Confidence: 75
Support Request: 10
close stale Enhancement request to allow snapcraft to connect to remote LXD instances instead of requiring local LXD, primarily for non-Linux hosts. Triaged but inactive for over a year with no implementation progress.
qwen3.6-35b-a3b-mtp-q6
Staleness: 85
Complexity: 55
Confidence: 70
Support Request: 5
keep open Allow snapcraft to build using remote LXD instead of local LXD, helping non-Linux developers. Triaged enhancement. Follow-up tracked in craft-providers issue 508 and internal ticket CRAFT-2554. Awaiting implementation.

Update history

No update history recorded yet.

Related work

  • Related To: canonical/craft-providers#508 (confidence 90%)

    Maintainer comment points here as the follow-up location; that issue covers enabling remote LXD cluster support for the LXD provider and is still open.

Related issues

Issue Project State Summary Similarity
#1896820 Snapcraft can't be run against a local or remote LXD project snapcraft (launchpad) open Feature request from the LXD maintainer for snapcraft to support LXD projects (local/remote) for isolated or cluster-based builds. ~6 years old, no labels, zero comments, no maintainer response. Overlaps with remote LXD work tracked in snapcraft#4454.
82%
#1263 lxd: pass through commands into the container snapcraft merged Merged a pull request enabling snapcraft to pass build commands into LXD containers. The change allows remote builds to execute within the container environment, addressing path mounting issues during remote snap creation. Approved by one reviewer, though coverage decreased slightly.
70%
#1839399 snapcraft not pulling snap from lxd container snapcraft (launchpad) open 2019 report that snapcraft 3.7.1 with --use-lxd built a snap inside the LXD container but never copied it back to the host. No labels, no maintainer interaction, 7 years old; the LXD provider has since been rewritten via craft-providers.
70%