A pull request must not touch :latest

This runner builds on the host's Docker daemon — the same daemon the live
container runs on — so retagging :latest IS a deployment. Watchtower compares
the running container's image against :latest, sees they differ, and recreates
the container from whatever was just built locally. Gating only the push was
never enough; the build itself was the deploy.

The worse failure is quieter. Reassigning :latest leaves the running
container's old image untagged, and once that image is pruned Watchtower can no
longer read it to compare against:

  Failed to retrieve container image info: No such image: sha256:…
  Unable to update container: no available image info.

bennett-portfolio hit exactly that. It sat on a four-day-old build, failing to
update 720 times in twenty-four hours, reporting healthy the whole time, and had
to be recreated by hand. This repo has the same workflow and the same exposure —
it simply has not been unlucky yet.

A PR now builds pr-<number>, which nothing watches. Trivy scans whatever was
built either way, so a bad Dockerfile or a new CVE still blocks the merge, and
the push step is unchanged — still main-only.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <[email protected]>

.gitea/workflows/build.yml

@@ -40,7 +40,35 @@ jobs:
             mvn -B -ntp -s .gitea/ci-settings.xml -DskipFrontend=true verify
 
       # Build + Trivy on every run (PRs included), so a broken Dockerfile or a new HIGH/CRITICAL CVE
-      # blocks the merge. Only the push is main-only.
+      # blocks the merge.
+      #
+      # A PULL REQUEST MUST NOT TOUCH THE :latest TAG. This runner builds on the host's Docker daemon —
+      # the same daemon the live container runs on — so retagging :latest IS a deployment: Watchtower
+      # compares the running container's image against :latest, finds they differ, and recreates the
+      # container from the locally built image. Gating only the push is not enough; the build is the
+      # deploy.
+      #
+      # The damage is not only that unmerged code ships. Reassigning :latest leaves the running
+      # container's old image untagged, and once that image is pruned Watchtower can no longer read it
+      # to compare against, so it gives up every cycle:
+      #
+      #   Failed to retrieve container image info: No such image: sha256:…
+      #   Unable to update container "/<name>": no available image info.
+      #
+      # That happened to bennett-portfolio on 2026-07-27: it sat on a four-day-old build, failing to
+      # update 720 times in twenty-four hours, reporting healthy throughout. It had to be recreated by
+      # hand. This repo has the same workflow and the same exposure.
+      #
+      # So a PR builds pr-<number>, which nothing watches. Trivy scans whatever was built, and the push
+      # step below still only runs off a PR.
+      - name: Choose the image tag
+        run: |
+          if [ "${{ github.event_name }}" = "pull_request" ]; then
+            echo "IMAGE_TAG=pr-${{ github.event.number }}" >> "$GITHUB_ENV"
+          else
+            echo "IMAGE_TAG=latest" >> "$GITHUB_ENV"
+          fi
+
       - name: Build image
         env:
           DOCKER_BUILDKIT: "1"
@@ -51,17 +79,17 @@ jobs:
             --secret id=maven_user,env=MAVEN_USER \
             --secret id=maven_token,env=MAVEN_TOKEN \
             --build-arg GIT_SHA=${{ github.sha }} \
-            -t git.thebennett.net/reformedwitness/confessions-of-grace:latest -t git.thebennett.net/reformedwitness/confessions-of-grace:${{ github.sha }} .
+            -t "git.thebennett.net/reformedwitness/confessions-of-grace:$IMAGE_TAG" -t git.thebennett.net/reformedwitness/confessions-of-grace:${{ github.sha }} .
 
       - name: Scan image (Trivy)
         run: |
           docker run --rm -v /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock \
             aquasec/trivy:latest image --scanners vuln --severity HIGH,CRITICAL --ignore-unfixed --no-progress \
-            git.thebennett.net/reformedwitness/confessions-of-grace:latest || true
+            "git.thebennett.net/reformedwitness/confessions-of-grace:$IMAGE_TAG" || true
           docker run --rm -v /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock \
             aquasec/trivy:latest image --scanners vuln --severity HIGH,CRITICAL --ignore-unfixed \
             --pkg-types library --exit-code 1 --no-progress \
-            git.thebennett.net/reformedwitness/confessions-of-grace:latest
+            "git.thebennett.net/reformedwitness/confessions-of-grace:$IMAGE_TAG"
 
       # Publish only on a real push to main (or manual dispatch) — never from a pull request.
       - name: Push image