2018-05-06 Sunday - Experimenting with Docker on Windows

Today I uninstalled Oracle's VirtualBox software - and decided that I would use Docker for Windows exclusively going forward.

There are two options for downloading Docker Community Edition - from either the Stable or Edge channels.

https://docs.docker.com/install/

• Stable gives you reliable updates every quarter.
• Edge gives you new features every month

I'm running the latest Edge channel release (18.05.0-ce-rc1-win63)

So far, it has been a joyful experience.


Choosing Edge gives you the ability to run a standalone Kubernetes server and client:
https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-windows/kubernetes/

• "Kubernetes is only available in Docker for Windows 18.02 CE Edge. Kubernetes support is not included in Docker for Windows 18.02 CE Stable"
• "Docker for Windows 18.02 CE Edge includes a standalone Kubernetes server and client, as well as Docker CLI integration. The Kubernetes server runs locally within your Docker instance, is not configurable, and is a single-node cluster."
• "The Kubernetes server runs within a Docker container on your local system, and is only for local testing. When Kubernetes support is enabled, you can deploy your workloads, in parallel, on Kubernetes, Swarm, and as standalone containers."

I noted that the install process doesn't offer the option of installing on a different drive - but you can configure where the Disk Image Location is specified.  In the system tray, you'll see the whale icon:




Which you can right-click to access "Settings" - to then modify the Docker Disk Image Location path, for example:

The Docker documentation is excellent:

https://docs.docker.com/get-started/

https://docs.docker.com/get-started/#containers-and-virtual-machines

• "A container runs natively on Linux and shares the kernel of the host machine with other containers. It runs a discrete process, taking no more memory than any other executable, making it lightweight."
• "By contrast, a virtual machine (VM) runs a full-blown “guest” operating system with virtual access to host resources through a hypervisor. In general, VMs provide an environment with more resources than most applications need."

https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-windows/
https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-windows/install/
https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-windows/install/#what-to-know-before-you-install
https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-windows/install/#switch-between-windows-and-linux-containers