diff --git a/.gitmodules b/.gitmodules
index eae2aa637..913725b85 100644
--- a/.gitmodules
+++ b/.gitmodules
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
 [submodule "ceph"]
 	path = ceph
-	url = git@github.com:quantum/ceph
+	url = https://github.com/quantum/ceph.git
 	branch = wip-embedded-ceph
diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index 7e437ea77..38aff00f6 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -94,7 +94,7 @@ build: vendor ceph
 	@echo "##### configuring ceph" 
 	cd ceph/build && cmake $(CEPHD_CMAKE) ..
 	@echo "##### building ceph" 
-	cd ceph/build && $(MAKE) $(MFLAGS) cephd
+	cd ceph/build && $(MAKE) $(MAKEFLAGS) $(MFLAGS) cephd
 ifeq ($(DEBUG),0)
 	@echo "##### stripping libcephd.a" 
 	strip -S ceph/build/lib/libcephd.a
@@ -104,6 +104,7 @@ endif
 	@echo "##### building castlectl" 
 	go build $(BUILDFLAGS) -tags '$(TAGS)' -ldflags '$(LDFLAGS)' -o bin/castlectl ./cmd/castlectl
 
+.PHONY: ceph
 ceph:
 	git submodule update --init --recursive
 
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 89d118707..187dbc7db 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -1,2 +1,3 @@
 # Castle - Software Defined Storage
 
+[![Circle CI](https://circleci.com/gh/quantum/castle.svg?style=svg&circle-token=2b2ee7eb7f621e612a76f861353e141a8caaf8dd)](https://circleci.com/gh/quantum/castle)
diff --git a/build/build-container/Dockerfile b/build/build-container/Dockerfile
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..a143ac03f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/build/build-container/Dockerfile
@@ -0,0 +1,57 @@
+FROM ubuntu:xenial
+MAINTAINER Bassam Tabbara <bassam.tabbara@quantum.com>
+
+# git version 2.6.6+ through 2.8.3 had a bug with submodules
+# see https://github.com/git/git/blob/master/Documentation/RelNotes/2.8.3.txt#L33
+# this is why we are adding a newer verion of git than is available on xenial
+
+RUN apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys E1DF1F24 && \
+    echo "deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/git-core/ppa/ubuntu xenial main" > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/git.list && \
+    apt-get update && DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive apt-get install -yq \
+    build-essential \
+    ca-certificates \
+    cmake \
+    curl \
+    cython \
+    cython3 \
+    git \
+    golang-1.6 \
+    libaio-dev \
+    libatomic-ops-dev \
+    libblkid-dev \
+    libboost-date-time-dev \
+    libboost-dev \
+    libboost-iostreams-dev \
+    libboost-program-options-dev \
+    libboost-random-dev \
+    libboost-regex-dev \
+    libboost-system-dev \
+    libboost-thread-dev \
+    libcrypto++-dev \
+    libcurl4-openssl-dev \
+    libexpat1-dev \
+    libfcgi-dev \
+    libgoogle-perftools-dev \
+    libjemalloc-dev \
+    libkeyutils-dev \
+    libldap2-dev \
+    libleveldb-dev \
+    libsnappy-dev \
+    libssl-dev \
+    libudev-dev \
+    python-sphinx \
+    python-dev \
+    python3-all-dev \
+    xfslibs-dev \
+    yasm \
+    --no-install-recommends && \
+    apt-get clean && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/* /tmp/* /var/tmp/*
+
+ENV GOPATH /go
+ENV PATH $GOPATH/bin:/usr/lib/go-1.6/bin:$PATH
+RUN mkdir -p "$GOPATH/src" "$GOPATH/bin" && chmod -R 777 "$GOPATH"
+
+VOLUME $GOPATH/src/github.com/quantum/castle
+WORKDIR $GOPATH/src/github.com/quantum/castle
+
+ENTRYPOINT [ "/bin/bash", "-c" ]
diff --git a/build/publish-build-container.sh b/build/publish-build-container.sh
new file mode 100755
index 000000000..58e375abc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/build/publish-build-container.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+#!/bin/bash -e
+
+scriptdir="$( cd "$( dirname "${BASH_SOURCE[0]}" )" && pwd )"
+
+cd $scriptdir/build-container
+docker build -t quantum/castle-build .
+docker push quantum/castle-build
diff --git a/build/run-build.sh b/build/run-build.sh
new file mode 100755
index 000000000..d74088d12
--- /dev/null
+++ b/build/run-build.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,21 @@
+#!/bin/bash -e
+
+scriptdir="$( cd "$( dirname "${BASH_SOURCE[0]}" )" && pwd )"
+
+# git version 2.6.6+ through 2.8.3 had a bug with submodules
+# see https://github.com/git/git/blob/master/Documentation/RelNotes/2.8.3.txt#L33
+function ver { 
+    printf "%d%03d%03d%03d" $(echo "$1" | tr '.' ' ') 
+}
+gitversion=$(git --version | cut -d" " -f3)
+if (( $(ver ${gitversion}) > $(ver 2.6.6) && $(ver ${gitversion}) < $(ver 2.8.3) )); then
+    echo WARN: your running git version ${gitversion} which has a bug realted to relative
+    echo WARN: submodule paths. Please consider upgrading to 2.8.3 or later
+fi
+
+docker run \
+    -it \
+    -v ${HOME}/.netrc:/root/.netrc \
+    -v ${scriptdir}/..:/go/src/github.com/quantum/castle \
+    quantum/castle-build \
+    "$*"
diff --git a/circle.yml b/circle.yml
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..fae0cfbbf
--- /dev/null
+++ b/circle.yml
@@ -0,0 +1,17 @@
+machine:
+  environment:
+    NPROCS: 16
+  services:
+    - docker
+
+dependencies:
+  override:
+    - docker info
+    - docker login -e $DOCKER_EMAIL -u $DOCKER_USER -p $DOCKER_PASS
+    - docker pull quantum/castle-build
+    - echo -e "machine github.com\n\tlogin quantumbuild\n\tpassword $GITHUB_TOKEN" > ~/.netrc
+    - ./build/run-build.sh make -j$NPROCS build
+
+test:
+  override:
+    - echo no tests
diff --git a/dist/Dockerfile b/dist/Dockerfile
deleted file mode 100644
index 73181ee45..000000000
--- a/dist/Dockerfile
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,7 +0,0 @@
-FROM ubuntu:16.04
-MAINTAINER Bassam Tabbara <bassam.tabbara@quantum.com>
-
-VOLUME /ceph
-VOLUME /build
-
-ENTRYPOINT ["/tmp/entrypoint.sh", "/tmp/micro-ceph"]