Prevent Gitlab adding -NoProfile to PowerShell when starting a docker container - powershell

Question

1. How can I prevent Gitlab from adding -NoProfile when creating the docker container?
2. What's the difference between using powershell with -NoProfile and without it?
3. Is there any way if I run powershell -NoProfile to somehow load/run the default profile and to revert the effect of setting -NoProfile flag?
And now the story behind these questions:
MSBuild (Visual Studio build tool command) fails to build Xamarin app when used in docker container started by Gitlab with Powershell -NoProfile.
I created a docker image for CI purspose and everything is working properly if I run the container manually, but when it is run during Gitlab runner job, it fails (more exactly msbuild /t:SignAndroidPackage fails, because of some file does not gets generated). I inspected this (put a sleep of 1 hour in gitlab-ci.yml and attached to the container on the runner machine) and found out that Gitlab starts the container with PowerShell -NoProfile...I tried that manually(start the container with -NoProfile) and I reproduced the issue.
the error is:
Could not find a part of the path 'C:\builds\gitlab\HMI.Framework\KDI\sub\HostApplicationToolkit\sub\KBle\KBle\sub\XamarinBluetooth\Source\Plugin.BLE.Android\Resources\Resource.Designer.cs'
Here the Resource.Designer.cs is missing (and it should be auto-generated during the build process)
This is the dockerFile:
# escape=`
# Use the latest Windows Server Core image with .NET Framework 4.8.
FROM mcr.microsoft.com/dotnet/framework/sdk:3.5-windowsservercore-ltsc2019
ENV VS_STUDIO_INSTALL_LINK=https://download.visualstudio.microsoft.com/download/pr/befdb1f9-8676-4693-b031-65ee44835915/c541feeaa77b97681f7693fc5bed2ff82b331b168c678af1a95bdb1138a99802/vs_Community.exe
ENV VS_INSTALLER_PATH=C:\TEMP\vs2019.exe
ENV ANDROID_COMPILE_SDK=29
# Restore the default Windows shell for correct batch processing.
SHELL ["cmd", "/S", "/C"]
ADD $VS_STUDIO_INSTALL_LINK $VS_INSTALLER_PATH
RUN %VS_INSTALLER_PATH% --quiet --wait --norestart --nocache --includeRecommended --includeOptional`
--add Microsoft.VisualStudio.Workload.NetCrossPlat `
--add Microsoft.VisualStudio.Workload.XamarinBuildTools `
|| IF "%ERRORLEVEL%"=="3010" EXIT 0
RUN del %VS_INSTALLER_PATH%
# set some util paths
RUN setx JAVA_HOME "c:\Program Files\Android\jdk\microsoft_dist_openjdk_1.8.0.25\"
RUN setx path "%path%;c:\Program Files (x86)\Android\android-sdk\tools\bin;c:\Program Files (x86)\Android\android-sdk\platform-tools"
# update android SDK with API 29
RUN echo y| sdkmanager "platforms;android-%ANDROID_COMPILE_SDK%"
#ENTRYPOINT ["powershell.exe", "-NoLogo", "-ExecutionPolicy", "Bypass"]
This is the gitlab-ci.yml
image: visualstudio2019-xamarin-ci:1.0-windowsservercore-ltsc2019
stages:
- build
- test
variables:
GIT_SUBMODULE_STRATEGY: 'recursive'
build_kdi:
stage: build
only:
- CI_CD
tags:
- docker-windows
script:
- '& "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2019\Community\MSBuild\Current\Bin\MSBuild.exe" ./src/KDI/KDI.sln /t:Restore /p:AndroidBuildApplicationPackage=true /p:Configuration=Release'
- '& "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2019\Community\MSBuild\Current\Bin\MSBuild.exe" /p:Configuration=Release /t:SignAndroidPackage /property:SolutionDir="C:\builds\gitlab\HMI.Framework\KDI\src\KDI\" /p:AndroidSigningKeyStore="C:\builds\gitlab\HMI.Framework\KDI\distribution\Android\KrohneAndroidKeystore.keystore" .\src\KDI\KDI\KDI.Android\KDI.Android.csproj'
run_bb_tests:
stage: test
only:
- CI_CD
tags:
- docker-windows
script:
- docker-ci/install_and_run_bb_tests.bat "phone_ip" "5555" arg1 arg2 || true
- adb pull /storage/emulated/0/Android/data/myApp/files/Exports/BBT_Exports/BBTests_CI C:\test_results
artifacts:
paths:
- c:\test_results\BBTests_CI #expire in 1 month by default
If I start this image using : docker run -it myImage powershell everything works well, but if I run it docker run -it myImage powershell -NoProfile, msbuild fails at some step in building the xamarin app

Answer 1

How can I prevent Gitlab from adding -NoProfile when creating the docker container?
Apparently you can't...yet but there is a feature request in place
What's the difference between using powershell with -NoProfile and without it?
A PowerShell profile is just a file that contains things, like custom functions, for a specific user. For instance, if I were to have Function Banana(){Write-Host "Awesome"} in my PowerShell profile e.g $Home[My ]Documents\PowerShell\Profile.ps1. Whenever I open up PowerShell, it loads that function automatically. So I can open PowerShell, type banana and have the string Awesome written to stdout. If I were to start powershell with -NoProfile, and enter banana, I'd get CommandNotFoundException.
source
Is there any way if I run powershell -NoProfile to somehow load/run the default profile and to revert the effect of setting -NoProfile flag?
Maybe. And I only say maybe because I haven't personally tested it, but in theory it should work. If the profile is in the container, all you have to do is dot source it.
. "C:\path\to\powershell\profile.ps1"
dot sourcing the .ps1 file will run anything within it, inside the current scope, which includes loading functions, if any are present.
dot source docs
My expertise on Gitlab is limited, but due to my overall experience with Windows containers, PowerShell, as well as the nature of PowerShell profiles, I have doubts that the profiling is the root cause of this issue, but I don't have enough information/evidence to definitively say. Hope this helps in some way!