Avoid downloading Docker image every run in VSTS build

Question

My company is trying out VSTS (Visual Studio Team Services) and Docker and we are running into problems with downloading Docker images.

We have a build definition where we pull a Docker image and compile code and run tests in the container. The problem is that we need to pull a fairly large image (around 6-7 gb) every run and when setting this up it´s very time consuming.

Is there any way to avoid downloading Docker Images for every run? Should we be using Azure Private Docker Registry?

We are currently using Hosted Agents.

Answer 1

Hosted agents are "clean" every time -- nothing persists from build to build. This is why your Docker images aren't cached, which would normally be the case.

Set up a private agent and you won't have this issue.