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Ask HN: What are you going to use instead of Docker Desktop for macOS?

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Ask HN: What are you going to use instead of Docker Desktop for macOS?

#1

Post by rathboma »

Hey Everyone,

With the new Docker Desktop license rapidly approaching what is everyone replacing it with?

For Linux and Windows (with WSL) I just use the docker engine cli, but for Mac, I'm not sure.

Obviously some of you are just paying for it which is cool, but in this thread I'm specifically interested in alternatives.

Options I know about:

- Podman - https://podman.io/getting-started/installation - has complicated installation instructions for MacOS.

- Rancher Desktop - https://rancherdesktop.io/ - Focused on K8s rather than raw docker containers.

Re: Ask HN: What are you going to use instead of Docker Desktop for macOS?

#2

Post by xtracto »

I've tried both of those and minikube by itself. For me the main disadvantage has been compatibility with docker-compose. I've got several projects that I run using docker-compose.yml as a "turnkey" solution. The podman compatibility is unusable, and migrating to K8s manifest files is cumbersome. Also Rancher Desktop is not a complete replacement solution, once you install it you have to add some other stuff to make it work.

All this kind of has made me think more about the vendor lock-in that we were having with Docker. I am still looking for a more viable replacement.

Re: Ask HN: What are you going to use instead of Docker Desktop for macOS?

#3

Post by rmurri »

I've been using multipass for a couple months. It's been working well for my use case.

Here are a couple links I found about it: * https://www.cnbeining.com/2021/09/using-docker-and-docker-co... * https://gist.github.com/pmbaumgartner/b08a34f73afcd9b29227a4...

I also recently found out about colima, but haven't tried it out. * https://github.com/abiosoft/colima

Re: Ask HN: What are you going to use instead of Docker Desktop for macOS?

#6

Post by [deleted] »

xtracto wrote: post #2

I've tried both of those and minikube by itself. For me the main disadvantage has been compatibility with docker-compose. I've got several projects that I run using docker-compose.yml as a "turnkey" solution. The podman compatibility is unusable, and migrating to K8s manifest files is cumbersome. Also Rancher Desktop is not a complete replacement solution, once you install it you have to add some other stuff to make…

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: What are you going to use instead of Docker Desktop for macOS?

#7

Post by electroly »

lmarcos wrote: post #5

Linux virtual machine (via Vagrant, for instance) and inside I run docker.

Seconding this. On M1 processors, Parallels does a great job and this arrangement is vastly faster than Docker Desktop. The speed improvement alone makes it worth the cost of the Parallels license and the hassle of setting this up.

Re: Ask HN: What are you going to use instead of Docker Desktop for macOS?

#8

Post by lmarcos »

electroly wrote: post #7
lmarcos wrote: post #5

Linux virtual machine (via Vagrant, for instance) and inside I run docker.

Seconding this. On M1 processors, Parallels does a great job and this arrangement is vastly faster than Docker Desktop. The speed improvement alone makes it worth the cost of the Parallels license and the hassle of setting this up.

Additionally, I think now one can use Vmware fusion and the corresponding Vagrant plugin for free on M1 (because Virtualbox won't work anymore on the new Macs).
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