Accelerating dev container startup with automatic image caching

Gitpod introduces automated dev container image caching that reduces environment startup times from minutes to seconds without requiring configuration changes. The system automatically builds, caches, and retrieves container images using hash-based cache invalidation, with project-scoped security through AWS IAM policies. Performance improvements range from 73% to 92% faster startup times across different project types, while maintaining full dev container feature compatibility and user personalization.