AWS Beanstalk docker image automatic update doesn't work

You can use the aws command-line tool to trigger the update:

aws elasticbeanstalk update-environment --application-name [your_app_name] --environment-name [your_environment_name] --version-label [your_version_label]

You specify the version that contains the Dockerrun.aws.json file, that way a new version won't be added to the application. In this case the Dockerrun file works as the "source" for the application, but it only tells aws to pull the docker image, so it would be redundant to create new versions for the application in Elastic Beanstalk (unless you use specifically tagged docker images in the Dockerrun file)

Links:

http://docs.aws.amazon.com/elasticbeanstalk/latest/dg/create_deploy_docker_image.htmlhttp://docs.aws.amazon.com/elasticbeanstalk/latest/api/API_UpdateEnvironment.htm

The documentation should be more clear. What they are saying is with update=true:

EBS will do a docker pull before it does a docker run when the application is first started. It will not continually poll docker hub.

In contrast, issuing a docker run without first doing a docker pull will always use the locally stored version of that machine, which may not always be the latest.

In order to acheive what you want, you'll need to set up a webhook on Docker Hub, that calls an application you control, that rebuilds your ELB app.