diff --git a/web/gui/BUILD b/web/gui/BUILD
index f4c2c93..3a2bfcc 100644
--- a/web/gui/BUILD
+++ b/web/gui/BUILD
@@ -1,4 +1,32 @@
-NODE_VERSION = "8.0.1"
+"""
+ Copyright 2018-present Open Networking Foundation
+
+ Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+ you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+ You may obtain a copy of the License at
+
+     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+
+ Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+ distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+ WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+ See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+ limitations under the License.
+"""
+
+"""
+    Rules to build the ONOS GUI
+
+    Bazel and npm are incompatibe in how they deal with files. npm likes to follow links
+    to get back to the original canonical path names, and bazel uses links extensively when
+    populating the sandbox. To get around these problems, the rules that follow use filegroups
+    to specify the files as dependencies and then use a genrule to convert the files into a tar
+    ball. Once the tar ball is unrolled into the sandbox, the links are broken, but the build is
+    still hermetic since those files are referred to as dependencies in the genrule.
+
+    Also note that the onos-gui.tar contains files from //tools/gui and //web/gui, so the files are placed into
+    the sandbox at the proper locations and then returned as a tar ball.
+"""
 
 COMPILE_DEPS = CORE_DEPS + JACKSON + KRYO + [
     "@javax_ws_rs_api//jar",
@@ -20,69 +48,9 @@
     "//drivers/default:onos-drivers-default",
 ]
 
-genrule(
-    name = "_onos-gui-npm-install",
-    srcs = [
-        "//tools/gui:package.json",
-        "@nodejs//:bin/npm",
-    ] + glob(
-        [
-            "src/main/webapp/*.js",
-            "src/main/webapp/app/**/*.js",
-        ],
-        exclude = ["src/main/webapp/dist/*.js"],
-    ),
-    outs = ["onos-gui-npm-install.tar"],
-    cmd = "(ROOT=`pwd` &&" +
-          " NPM=$$ROOT/$(location @nodejs//:bin/npm) &&" +
-          " cd tools/gui &&" +
-          " $$NPM install --loglevel=error --no-cache --cache=$(@D)/.npm --no-update-notifier &&" +
-          " tar cf $$ROOT/$@ package.json node_modules)",
-    local = True,
-    visibility = ["//visibility:public"],
-)
-
-genrule(
-    name = "_onos-gui-npm-build",
-    srcs = [
-        "//tools/gui:gulpfile.babel.js",
-        ":_onos-gui-npm-install",
-        "@nodejs//:bin/npm",
-        "//tools/gui:package.json",
-    ] + glob(["src/main/webapp/*"]),
-    outs = ["onos-gui-npm-build.tar"],
-    cmd = "(ROOT=`pwd` &&" +
-          " NPM=$$ROOT/$(location @nodejs//:bin/npm) &&" +
-          " cd tools/gui &&" +
-          " tar xf ../../$(location :_onos-gui-npm-install) &&" +
-          " $$NPM run build --no-update-notifier &&" +
-          "  cd ../../web/gui/src/main/webapp &&" +
-          " jar cf $$ROOT/$@ dist vendor data tests README.md _doc _dev app/fw app/*.css app/*.js app/*.txt)",
-    local = True,
-    visibility = ["//visibility:public"],
-)
-
-genrule(
-    name = "_onos-gui-npm",
-    srcs = [
-        ":_onos-gui-npm-build",
-    ],
-    outs = ["onos-gui-npm.log"],
-    cmd = "ROOT=`pwd` && cd web/gui/src/main/webapp && tar xf $$ROOT/$(location :_onos-gui-npm-build) >$$ROOT/$@",
-    local = True,
-    visibility = ["//visibility:public"],
-)
-
-osgi_jar_with_tests(
-    name = "_onos-gui-base-jar",
-    exclude_tests = [
-        "org.onosproject.ui.impl.AbstractUiImplTest",
-        "org.onosproject.ui.impl.topo.model.AbstractTopoModelTest",
-    ],
-    test_deps = TEST_DEPS,
-    web_context = "/onos/ui",
-    deps = COMPILE_DEPS,
-)
+"""
+    Files that get put at the top level of the tar ball
+"""
 
 filegroup(
     name = "_root_level_files",
@@ -95,6 +63,10 @@
         ],
 )
 
+"""
+    Files that get put into the WEB-INF directory of the tar ball
+"""
+
 filegroup(
     name = "_web_inf_classes_files",
     srcs =
@@ -108,21 +80,122 @@
         ],
 )
 
+"""
+    webapp raw files
+"""
+
 filegroup(
     name = "_raw_classes_files",
     srcs = glob(["src/main/webapp/raw/**"]),
 )
 
-# app/view is packaged as a tar file because it has subdirectories that need to be preserved
+"""
+    dependency to expose all webapp files in the sandbox
+"""
+
+filegroup(
+    name = "_src_main_webapp_files",
+    srcs = glob([
+        "src/main/webapp/**",
+    ]),
+)
+
+"""
+    Install node.js and npm, and gather files needed from //tools/gui
+"""
+
+genrule(
+    name = "_onos-gui-npm-install",
+    srcs = [
+        "@nodejs//:bin/npm",
+        "//tools/gui:tools-gui-gulp",
+    ] + glob(
+        [
+            "src/main/webapp/*.js",
+            "src/main/webapp/app/**/*.js",
+        ],
+        exclude = ["src/main/webapp/dist/*.js"],
+    ),
+    outs = ["onos-gui-npm-install.tar"],
+    cmd = " ROOT=`pwd` &&" +
+          " export XDG_CONFIG_HOME=$(@D)/config &&" +  # npm config cache to the sandbos
+          " export BABEL_DISABLE_CACHE=1" +  # turn off babel cache
+          " NPM=$$ROOT/$(location @nodejs//:bin/npm) &&" +
+          " mkdir -p tools/gui &&" +
+          " cd tools/gui &&" +
+          " tar xf ../../$(location //tools/gui:tools-gui-gulp) &&" +
+          " $$NPM install  --no-cache --loglevel=error >npm-install.out 2>&1 &&" +
+          " tar hcf $$ROOT/$@ package.json gulpfile.babel.js node_modules gulp-tasks",
+)
+
+"""
+    Run npm build to create node.js files
+"""
+
+genrule(
+    name = "_onos-gui-npm-build",
+    srcs = [
+        "@nodejs//:bin/npm",
+        "@nodejs//:bin/node",
+        ":_onos-gui-npm-install",
+        ":_web_app_all",
+    ],
+    outs = ["onos-gui-npm-build.tar"],
+    cmd = "(ROOT=`pwd` &&" +
+          " export XDG_CONFIG_HOME=$(@D)/config &&" +
+          " export BABEL_DISABLE_CACHE=1" +
+          " NPM=$(location @nodejs//:bin/npm) &&" +
+          " (mkdir -p web/gui && cd web/gui && tar xf ../../$(location :_web_app_all)) &&" +
+          " mkdir -p tools/gui && cd tools/gui &&" +
+          " tar xf $$ROOT/$(location :_onos-gui-npm-install) &&" +
+          " $$ROOT/$$NPM run build --no-cache --loglevel=error >npm-build.out &&" +
+          " cd ../../web/gui/src/main/webapp &&" +
+          " jar cf $$ROOT/$@ dist vendor data tests README.md _doc _dev app/fw app/*.css app/*.js app/*.txt)",
+)
+
+"""
+    Make a jar file of all the webapp files. Useful for breaking symblic links in the sandbox
+"""
+
+genrule(
+    name = "_web_app_all",
+    srcs = [":_src_main_webapp_files"],
+    outs = ["web_app_all.tar"],
+    cmd = "cd web/gui && tar hcf ../../$@ src/main/webapp",
+)
+
+"""
+    app/view is packaged as a tar file because it has subdirectories that need to be preserved
+"""
+
 genrule(
     name = "_app_view_tar",
     srcs = glob(["src/main/webapp/app/view/**"]),
     outs = ["app_view_tar.tar"],
     cmd = " ROOT=`pwd` &&" +
           " cd web/gui/src/main/webapp/app/view &&" +
-          " tar cf $$ROOT/$@ .",
+          " tar hcf $$ROOT/$@ .",
 )
 
+"""
+    Builds the java jar for the java code provided by the GUI
+"""
+
+osgi_jar_with_tests(
+    name = "_onos-gui-base-jar",
+    exclude_tests = [
+        "org.onosproject.ui.impl.AbstractUiImplTest",
+        "org.onosproject.ui.impl.topo.model.AbstractTopoModelTest",
+    ],
+    test_deps = TEST_DEPS,
+    web_context = "/onos/ui",
+    deps = COMPILE_DEPS,
+)
+
+"""
+    Builds the tar ball for the ONOS GUI
+"""
+
 genrule(
     name = "onos-gui",
     srcs = [
@@ -141,10 +214,10 @@
           " (cd WEB-INF/classes && mkdir -p app/view && cd app/view && tar xf $$ROOT/$(location :_app_view_tar)) &&" +
           " for i in $(locations :_root_level_files); do cp $$ROOT/$$i .; done &&" +
           " for i in $(locations :_web_inf_classes_files); do cp $$ROOT/$$i ./WEB-INF/classes/; done &&" +
-          " mkdir ./WEB-INF/classes/raw && for i in $(locations :_raw_classes_files); do cp $$ROOT/$$i ./WEB-INF/classes/raw/; done &&" +
+          " mkdir ./WEB-INF/classes/raw && " +
+          " for i in $(locations :_raw_classes_files); do cp $$ROOT/$$i ./WEB-INF/classes/raw/; done &&" +
           " jar xf $$ROOT/$(location :_onos-gui-base-jar) &&" +
           " jar cmf META-INF/MANIFEST.MF $$ROOT/$@ .",
-    local = True,
     output_to_bindir = 1,
     visibility = ["//visibility:public"],
 )