Motivation

The --username and --password options allow default credentials to be defined. These are used if a corresponding entry cannot be found in .netrc, or if the --disable-netrc flag is set. (--username and --password should possibly be renamed to --default-username and --default-password to make this clearer.)

Specifying passwords as command line arguments is generally discouraged because they will then be visible in the the output of tools such as ps and top. Providing credentials in environment variables avoids this problem, although there may still be other ways for users on the same machine to discover their values.

Environment variables are also more convenient than .netrc when uploading to registries which use short-lived credentials, such as ECR:

export CONTAINERTOOL_USERNAME=AWS
export CONTAINERTOOL_PASSWORD=$(aws ecr get-login-password --region us-west-2)
swift run containertool --repository \
    123456789012.dkr.ecr.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/hello/world \
    .build/x86_64-swift-linux-musl/debug/hello-world

In the example above, if .netrc contains credentials for 123456789012.dkr.ecr.us-west-2.amazonaws.com they will be used in preference to the credentials in the environment variables. To avoid this, credentials which are not intended to be used should be removed from .netrc.

Modifications

If the --username or --password flags are not present on the command line, use the values of the CONTAINERTOOL_USERNAME or CONTAINERTOOL_PASSWORD environment variables - if defined - as the default credentials.

Result

• It is possible to define the default username and password without specifying their values on the command line, reducing the risk of leaking credentials to other users on the same system.
• It is possible to work with short-term credentials without needing to edit .netrc frequently.

Fixes #105

Test Plan

All existing tests continue to pass.
Tested manually with a registry using short-lived credentials.