Setup

SonarQube with Docker Compose

This Docker Compose setup deploys a complete SonarQube environment with PostgreSQL database and SonarScanner CLI.

Prerequisites

• Docker Engine 20.10.0+
• Docker Compose 2.0.0+
• At least 4GB of RAM available for Docker

Architecture

This setup includes three services:

1. PostgreSQL Database (sonarqube-db) - Database backend for SonarQube
2. SonarQube Server (sonarqube) - Main SonarQube application
3. SonarScanner CLI (sonar-scanner) - Container for code analysis (runs on demand)

Quick Start

1. Clone or create the project directory:

mkdir sonarqube-docker && cd sonarqube-docker

2. Create the docker-compose.yml file:

version: '3.8'
 
services:
  sonarqube-db:
    image: postgres:15-alpine
    container_name: sonarqube-postgres
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: sonarqube
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: sonarpass123
      POSTGRES_DB: sonarqube
    volumes:
      - postgres_data:/var/lib/postgresql/data
    networks:
      - sonarnet
    healthcheck:
      test: ["CMD-SHELL", "pg_isready -U sonarqube"]
      interval: 10s
      timeout: 5s
      retries: 5
 
  sonarqube:
    image: sonarqube:latest
    container_name: sonarqube
    restart: unless-stopped
    depends_on:
      sonarqube-db:
        condition: service_healthy
    environment:
      SONAR_JDBC_URL: jdbc:postgresql://sonarqube-db:5432/sonarqube
      SONAR_JDBC_USERNAME: sonarqube
      SONAR_JDBC_PASSWORD: sonarpass123
      # Optional: Increase memory for better performance
      SONAR_WEB_JAVAOPTS: "-Xmx512m -Xms128m"
    volumes:
      - sonarqube_data:/opt/sonarqube/data
      - sonarqube_extensions:/opt/sonarqube/extensions
      - sonarqube_logs:/opt/sonarqube/logs
      # Mount source code directory for scanning (optional)
      - ./projects:/projects
    ports:
      - "9000:9000"
    networks:
      - sonarnet
    ulimits:
      nproc: 65535
      nofile:
        soft: 65535
        hard: 65535
 
  sonar-scanner:
    image: sonarsource/sonar-scanner-cli:latest
    container_name: sonar-scanner-cli
    working_dir: /usr/src
    volumes:
      - ./projects:/usr/src
      - ./sonar-scanner/conf:/opt/sonar-scanner/conf
    networks:
      - sonarnet
    # This container doesn't run continuously
    command: ["sleep", "infinity"]
 
networks:
  sonarnet:
    driver: bridge
 
volumes:
  postgres_data:
  sonarqube_data:
  sonarqube_extensions:
  sonarqube_logs:

3. Create required directories:

mkdir -p projects sonar-scanner/conf

4. Start the services:

docker-compose up -d

Accessing SonarQube

• Web Interface: http://localhost:9000
• Default Credentials: admin/admin (you’ll be prompted to change on first login)

Using SonarScanner

To analyze your code with the SonarScanner container:

1. Place your project code in the projects directory

2. Create a sonar-project.properties file in your project root:

# Configure here general information about the environment, such as server connection details for download of plugins
sonar.host.url=http://sonarqube:9000
# Default source code encoding
 
sonar.sourceEncoding=UTF-8
# Enable or disable the reporting of Issues which are automatically resolved when a line of code receives an update.
 
sonar.issuesReport.console.enable=true
# Security - using admin token is recommended
 
# sonar.login=your-generated-token-from-sonarqube-web-ui
# Optional: Java scanner specific
 
sonar.java.source=11
sonar.java.target=11
 
# Optional: For multi-language projects
 
sonar.language=java,js,py,ts

3. Run the scanner for a specific project:

# Execute scanner inside the container
docker exec sonar-scanner-cli sonar-scanner \
  -Dsonar.projectKey=my-project \
  -Dsonar.sources=. \
  -Dsonar.host.url=http://sonarqube:9000 \
  -Dsonar.login=your-auth-token

Or run it directly from your host machine:

docker run --rm \
  --network sonarqube-docker_sonarnet \
  -v "$(pwd)/projects:/usr/src" \
  sonarsource/sonar-scanner-cli:latest \
  sonar-scanner \
  -Dsonar.projectKey=my-project \
  -Dsonar.sources=. \
  -Dsonar.host.url=http://sonarqube:9000 \
  -Dsonar.login=your-auth-token

Generating Authentication Token

1. Log into SonarQube at http://localhost:9000
2. Click your user icon → “My Account” → “Security”
3. Generate a token with a name like “scanner-token”
4. Use this token in your sonar-project.properties file or scanner command

Maintenance Commands

# View logs
docker-compose logs -f sonarqube
docker-compose logs -f sonarqube-db
 
# Stop services
docker-compose stop
 
# Start services
docker-compose start
 
# Restart services
docker-compose restart
 
# Stop and remove containers, networks
docker-compose down
 
# Stop and remove containers, networks, and volumes
docker-compose down -v
 
# Check service status
docker-compose ps
 
# View resource usage
docker-compose stats