diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index d7cb220a..60dde4c9 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -3,18 +3,15 @@
 #
 
 PKG_NAME    := synse-server
-PKG_VERSION := $(shell python -c "import synse_server ; print(synse_server.__version__)")
+PKG_VERSION := $(shell python setup.py --version)
 IMAGE_NAME  := vaporio/synse-server
-IMAGE_TAGS  ?= latest local
+
+GIT_COMMIT ?= $(shell git rev-parse --short HEAD 2> /dev/null || true)
+BUILD_DATE := $(shell date -u +%Y-%m-%dT%T 2> /dev/null)
 
 HAS_TRANSLATIONS := $(shell find synse_server -name '*.mo')
 HAS_PY36         := $(shell which python3.6 || python -V 2>&1 | grep 3.6 || python3 -V 2>&1 | grep 3.6)
 
-RED    := \033[0;31m
-GREEN  := \033[0;32m
-YELLOW := \033[0;33m
-NC     := \033[0m
-
 
 #
 # Utility Targets
@@ -67,7 +64,22 @@ deps:  ## Update the frozen pip dependencies (requirements.txt)
 
 .PHONY: docker
 docker: req-translations  ## Build the docker image locally
-	@ IMAGE_TAGS="$(IMAGE_TAGS)" IMAGE_NAME=$(IMAGE_NAME) ./bin/build.sh
+	# Build the slim image
+	docker build -f dockerfile/synse.dockerfile \
+		--label build_date=${BUILD_DATE} \
+		--label version=${PKG_VERSION} \
+		--label commit=${GIT_COMMIT} \
+		--target=slim \
+		-t ${IMAGE_NAME}:local-slim \
+		-t ${IMAGE_NAME}:latest-slim .
+
+	# Build the full image
+	docker build -f dockerfile/synse.dockerfile \
+		--label build_date=${BUILD_DATE} \
+		--label version=${PKG_VERSION} \
+		--label commit=${GIT_COMMIT} \
+		-t ${IMAGE_NAME}:local \
+		-t ${IMAGE_NAME}:latest .
 
 .PHONY: docs
 docs: clean-docs  ## Generate the User Guide and API documentation locally
@@ -96,7 +108,7 @@ lint:  ## Run linting checks on the project source code
 	tox -e lint
 
 .PHONY: run
-run: docker  ## Build and run Synse Server with emulator locally (localhost:5000)
+run:  ## Run Synse Server with emulator locally (localhost:5000)
 	docker run -d \
 		-p 5000:5000 \
 		-e SYNSE_LOGGING=debug \
diff --git a/bin/build.sh b/bin/build.sh
index 93f33507..6158c126 100755
--- a/bin/build.sh
+++ b/bin/build.sh
@@ -44,16 +44,16 @@ for tag in ${tags}; do
 
     # build the SLIM version of the tag
     docker build -f dockerfile/synse.dockerfile \
-        --build-arg BUILD_DATE=${build_date} \
-		--build-arg BUILD_VERSION=${version} \
-		--build-arg VCS_REF=${git_commit} \
+		--label build-date=${build_date} \
+		--label version=${version} \
+		--label commit=${git_commit} \
 		--target=slim \
 		-t "${image}:${tag}-slim" .
 
-    # build the FULL verison of the tag
+    # build the FULL version of the tag
     docker build -f dockerfile/synse.dockerfile \
-        --build-arg BUILD_DATE=${build_date} \
-		--build-arg BUILD_VERSION=${version} \
-		--build-arg VCS_REF=${git_commit} \
+		--label build-date=${build_date} \
+		--label version=${version} \
+		--label commit=${git_commit} \
 		-t "${image}:${tag}" .
 done
diff --git a/bin/install_emulator.sh b/bin/install_emulator.sh
deleted file mode 100755
index 5d8d976c..00000000
--- a/bin/install_emulator.sh
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,38 +0,0 @@
-#!/usr/bin/env bash
-
-# install_emulator.sh
-#
-# This script is used to install the latest release of the emulator
-# plugin into the current working directory. This is used in the
-# Synse Server Dockerfile, but can also be run locally.
-#
-# This script requires `curl` and `jq` to be installed.
-#
-# The following environment variables can be used with the script
-# to modify the default behavior:
-#   EMULATOR_BIN - the name of the emulator binary to download. see
-#      https://github.com/vapor-ware/synse-emulator-plugin/releases
-#      for the names of all available assets. (default: emulator_linux_amd64)
-#   EMULATOR_OUT - the path to output the downloaded binary
-#      (default: `./$EMULATOR_BIN`)
-#
-set -o errexit -o pipefail
-
-EMULATOR_REPO=vapor-ware/synse-emulator-plugin
-
-EMULATOR_BIN=${EMULATOR_BIN:-"emulator_linux_amd64"}
-EMULATOR_OUT=${EMULATOR_OUT:-""}
-
-# Get the GitHub release data for the Synse Emulator Plugin repo.
-data=$(curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/${EMULATOR_REPO}/releases/latest)
-
-# Get the URL for the latest release asset binary.
-bin_url=$(echo ${data} | jq --arg bin "$EMULATOR_BIN" '.assets[] | select(.name == $bin) | .url' | tr -d '"')
-
-# Download the binary
-curl -L -H "Accept: application/octet-stream" -o ${EMULATOR_BIN} ${bin_url}
-chmod +x ${EMULATOR_BIN}
-
-if [[ "$EMULATOR_OUT" ]]; then
-    mv ${EMULATOR_BIN} ${EMULATOR_OUT}
-fi
diff --git a/bin/synse-server b/bin/synse-server
index c6c95418..50c1916e 100755
--- a/bin/synse-server
+++ b/bin/synse-server
@@ -125,4 +125,4 @@ do
 done
 
 # start synse
-python synse_server
\ No newline at end of file
+python -m synse_server
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/dockerfile/synse.dockerfile b/dockerfile/synse.dockerfile
index 962534da..76ad4193 100644
--- a/dockerfile/synse.dockerfile
+++ b/dockerfile/synse.dockerfile
@@ -14,46 +14,32 @@
 FROM vaporio/python:3.6 as builder
 COPY requirements.txt .
 
-WORKDIR /build
-
 RUN pip install --prefix=/build -r /requirements.txt --no-warn-script-location \
  && rm -rf /root/.cache
 
-# TODO (etd): Could install synse-server in this stage..
-
+COPY . /synse
+RUN pip install --no-deps --prefix=/build --no-warn-script-location /synse \
+ && rm -rf /root/.cache
 
 #
 # SLIM
 #
 FROM vaporio/python:3.6-slim as slim
-COPY --from=builder /build /usr/local
 
 RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends tini \
  && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*
 
-COPY . /synse
-WORKDIR /synse
+LABEL maintainer="Vapor IO" \
+      name="vaporio/synse-server" \
+      url="https://github.com/vapor-ware/synse-server"
 
 # Create directories for plugin sockets and configuration, then
 # install Synse Server as a python package
+# TODO: this will eventually be done via synse-server itself..
 RUN mkdir -p /tmp/synse/procs \
- && mkdir -p /synse/config \
- && pip install . \
- && rm -rf /root/.cache
-
-# Set image metadata (see: http://label-schema.org/rc1/)
-ARG BUILD_VERSION
-ARG BUILD_DATE
-ARG VCS_REF
+ && mkdir -p /synse/config
 
-LABEL maintainer="Vapor IO"\
-      org.label-schema.schema-version="1.0" \
-      org.label-schema.build-date=$BUILD_DATE \
-      org.label-schema.name="vaporio/synse-server" \
-      org.label-schema.vcs-url="https://github.com/vapor-ware/synse-server" \
-      org.label-schema.vcs-ref=$VCS_REF \
-      org.label-schema.vendor="Vapor IO" \
-      org.label-schema.version=$BUILD_VERSION
+COPY --from=builder /build /usr/local
 
 ENTRYPOINT ["/usr/bin/tini", "--", "synse-server"]
 
@@ -63,13 +49,23 @@ ENTRYPOINT ["/usr/bin/tini", "--", "synse-server"]
 #
 FROM slim as full
 
-# Environment variables for built-in emulator configuration.
+# Environment variables for built-in emulator configuration and
+# installation from GitHub release.
 ENV PLUGIN_DEVICE_CONFIG="/synse/emulator/config/device" \
-    PLUGIN_CONFIG="/synse/emulator"
+    PLUGIN_CONFIG="/synse/emulator" \
+    EMULATOR_VERSION="2.3.1"
 
+# Install the specified version of the emulator.
 RUN apt-get update \
- && apt-get install --no-install-recommends -y jq curl \
- && EMULATOR_OUT=/usr/local/bin/synse-emulator ./bin/install_emulator.sh \
- && apt-get purge -y jq curl \
+ && apt-get install --no-install-recommends -y curl \
+ && curl -L \
+    -H "Accept: application/octet-stream" \
+    -o /usr/local/bin/synse-emulator \
+    https://github.com/vapor-ware/synse-emulator-plugin/releases/download/${EMULATOR_VERSION}/emulator_linux_amd64 \
+ && chmod +x /usr/local/bin/synse-emulator \
+ && apt-get purge -y curl \
  && apt-get autoremove -y \
  && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*
+
+# Copy in the emulator configurations.
+COPY emulator /synse/emulator
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index 7f82c3a4..80ad8f8b 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -4,34 +4,39 @@
 #
 #    pip-compile --output-file requirements.txt setup.py
 #
-aiocache==0.8.0
-aiofiles==0.3.2           # via sanic
+adal==1.2.1               # via kubernetes
+aiocache==0.10.1
+aiofiles==0.4.0           # via sanic
+asn1crypto==0.24.0        # via cryptography
 bison==0.1.0
-cachetools==2.1.0         # via google-auth
-certifi==2018.4.16        # via kubernetes, requests
+cachetools==3.1.0         # via google-auth
+certifi==2018.11.29       # via kubernetes, requests
+cffi==1.11.5              # via cryptography
 chardet==3.0.4            # via requests
-google-auth==1.5.0        # via kubernetes
-grpcio==1.10.1
+cryptography==2.5         # via adal
+google-auth==1.6.2        # via kubernetes
+grpcio==1.18.0
 httptools==0.0.11         # via sanic
-idna==2.7                 # via requests
-ipaddress==1.0.22         # via kubernetes
-kubernetes==6.0.0
-multidict==4.4.2          # via sanic
-oauthlib==2.1.0           # via requests-oauthlib
-protobuf==3.5.2.post1     # via grpcio
-pyasn1-modules==0.2.1     # via google-auth
-pyasn1==0.4.3             # via pyasn1-modules, rsa
-python-dateutil==2.7.3    # via kubernetes
+idna==2.8                 # via requests
+kubernetes==8.0.1
+multidict==4.5.2          # via sanic
+oauthlib==3.0.1           # via requests-oauthlib
+protobuf==3.6.1
+pyasn1-modules==0.2.4     # via google-auth
+pyasn1==0.4.5             # via pyasn1-modules, rsa
+pycparser==2.19           # via cffi
+pyjwt==1.7.1              # via adal
+python-dateutil==2.8.0    # via adal, kubernetes
 pyyaml==4.2b4
-requests-oauthlib==1.0.0  # via kubernetes
-requests==2.20.0
-rsa==3.4.2                # via google-auth
-sanic==0.8.3
-six==1.11.0               # via google-auth, grpcio, kubernetes, protobuf, python-dateutil, structlog, websocket-client
+requests-oauthlib==1.2.0  # via kubernetes
+requests==2.21.0
+rsa==4.0                  # via google-auth
+sanic==18.12.0
+six==1.12.0               # via cryptography, google-auth, grpcio, kubernetes, protobuf, python-dateutil, structlog, websocket-client
 structlog==19.1.0
 synse-grpc==1.1.0
 ujson==1.35               # via sanic
-urllib3==1.23             # via kubernetes, requests
-uvloop==0.9.1             # via sanic
-websocket-client==0.48.0  # via kubernetes
-websockets==5.0.1         # via sanic
+urllib3==1.24.1           # via kubernetes, requests
+uvloop==0.12.0            # via sanic
+websocket-client==0.54.0  # via kubernetes
+websockets==6.0           # via sanic
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index 26bf35f0..e76fde04 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -46,6 +46,8 @@
         'sanic>=0.8.0',
         'structlog',
         'synse-grpc>=1.1.0',
+        # FIXME: protobuf should be removed here, it should be a dep of synse_grpc
+        'protobuf',
     ],
     tests_require=[
         'aiohttp',
diff --git a/tox.ini b/tox.ini
index 1e08ebb1..7fb15369 100644
--- a/tox.ini
+++ b/tox.ini
@@ -24,7 +24,7 @@ commands =
 deps =
     pip-tools
 commands =
-    pip-compile --output-file requirements.txt setup.py
+    pip-compile --upgrade --output-file requirements.txt setup.py
 
 
 [testenv:docs]