IntelliJ IDEA 2025.2 Help

Dev Container CLI

The Dev Container CLI provides a way to build Dev Containers directly on the client’s infrastructure. It offers flexible and customizable builds through local scripts, supporting various environments and workflows—such as CI pipelines and remote development setups. This tool automates the entire Dev Container preparation process.

You can download the Dev Container CLI as a ZIP archive containing a JAR file and run it directly from the terminal.

Prerequisites

Before configuring the Dev Container CLI, ensure the following prerequisites are met:

  • The ZIP distribution requires JDK 17 or newer to be installed.

  • The project for which you want to build a Dev Container must contain a devcontainer.json file.

Configure CLI

Install and run Dev Container CLI

  1. Download and unpack the .zip file.

    Alternatively, you can use the following command:

    curl -f -L -o intellij-devcontainers-cli.zip "https://jb.gg/intellij-devcontainers-cli.zip/latest"

    Check the following example link to the deployed distribution:

    https://download.jetbrains.com/resources/intellij/dev-containers/243.19420.43/intellij-devcontainers-cli.zip
  2. In the terminal, locate the ijcdev script file.

    Run the script from the current directory using the following command:

    ./ijdevc

    The ijdevc script file contains the following parameters:

    • SOURCE: a directory to a project where the devcontainer.json file is located.

    • config: defines a path to a devcontainer.json file.

    • format: structures the output for clearer representation.

Build Dev Container

  1. Execute the script with the config parameter and a local path to the project's devcontainer.json file.

    Run the following command:

    ./ijdevc --config /full/path/to/project/.devcontainer/devcontainer.json /full/path/to/project

    Check the following example:

    ./ijdevc --config /Users/jetbrains/spring-petclinic/.devcontainer/devcontainer.json /Users/jetbrains/spring-petclinic
  2. The output of the CLI operation is a Dev Container artifact with the project sources inside, along with all necessary tooling for its build.

    Check the following detailed information of the prepared Dev Container, along with its ID:

    Dev container build
31 July 2025