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Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

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Re: Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

#61

Post by ChuckMcM »

gumby wrote: post #34
lostmsu wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole notion of containers is basically this. That's why I am not sure why not just fix the OS. If there's anything to fix in the first place.

I always felt, perhaps uncharitably, that the point of containers was "those other programmers are idiots so we need to encapsulate everything for the sake of defense"

I don't think so. Consider that computers are generally so powerful these days that when running a single application stack their seriously under utilized. The first way people went about getting this going was Virtual Machines (made popular by IBM with its VM/370 OS :-) and that works well but when all of your clients are running the exact same OS down to the same version, it is kind of waste to have 'n' copies of the OS loaded, so containers are a 'semantic' fractioning of the resources where the OS is common but the set of processes are unique to a client. You still need a way to allocate from the single set of resources so containers provide that abstraction.

Re: Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

#62

Post by dkarapetyan »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #61
gumby wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always felt, perhaps uncharitably, that the point of containers was "those other programmers are idiots so we need to encapsulate everything for the sake of defense"

I don't think so. Consider that computers are generally so powerful these days that when running a single application stack their seriously under utilized. The first way people went about getting this going was Virtual Machines (made popular by IBM with its VM/370 OS :-) and that works well but when all of your clients are running the exact same OS down to the same version, it is kind of waste to have 'n' copies of t…

What exactly is the problem with process sandboxing and language level VMs? The industry is tackling all the wrong problems. So have we given up on process sandboxing with capabilities? The whole containerization movement is one giant hammer to kill a fly kinda business these days. While you guys are figuring all this out I'm gonna stick with BEAM, JVM, and other tried and true methods. I'll check back in another 5 years to see what this mess has turned into. Maybe that's enough time to figure out how all the overlay networking is working out because, you know, we need a few more overlays between the hardware and the VM.

Re: Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

#63

Post by thiht »

pikzen wrote: post #17
gtrevorjay wrote: post #15

This is clearly a trend, though it remains to see if it will garner enough acceptance to actually be "the future". systemd supports launching container-based services via nspawn and already namespaces "legacy" services very heavily. In fact, systemd et al were among the heaviest early drivers of cgroup technology for cleaner starting and stopping of groups of processes.

Unfortunately, systemd/nspawn does not benefit from the hype Docker garners, despite being infinitely better. This industry is becoming more and more hype and cargo-cult driven, instead of making sane technological choices

>despite being infinitely better

How and why?

You're being condescending. I like Docker and if anything you make me not want to try systemd-nspawn with this attitude.

Re: Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

#64

Post by Esau »

gtrevorjay wrote: post #15

This is clearly a trend, though it remains to see if it will garner enough acceptance to actually be "the future". systemd supports launching container-based services via nspawn and already namespaces "legacy" services very heavily. In fact, systemd et al were among the heaviest early drivers of cgroup technology for cleaner starting and stopping of groups of processes.

> This is clearly a trend

More like a virus.

Re: Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

#65

Post by numbsafari »

user5994461 wrote: post #42
zerocrates wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of thing happens when the base system is ubiquitous and therefore hard to change. It's easier to layer something on top of the base, where people can "opt in" and there's a large preexisting compatible audience. Changing the base layer itself at a minimum requires people to upgrade, and now you don't have that advantage of the preexisting audience anymore. If your improvement requires a breaking change, the…

There is an advantage in layering components, or building new software on top of existing components. However, a minor improvement or bugfix should be done in the component that is responsible for it. Creating another layer instead of fixing the problem is just creating more problems.

You can go whole hog with "containers" by just adopting unikernels.

But, unless you are willing to abandon Linux/Unix, this is kinda where you are left.

Re: Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

#66

Post by DigitalJack »

dkarapetyan wrote: post #60

I have to say this enrages me. The system services are still privileged containers and we are now basically emulating a micro-kernel (very badly I might add with a monolithic kernel). If you want to use a micro-kernel then use a fucking micro-kernel. Hacking a micro-kernel with docker is not the right approach, especially given the stability track record of docker itself. It's a hack and aesthetically unpleasant on a…

You have serious problems if this enrages you. Let other people hack in peace. Go do your own "right" thing and leave the rest of us alone.

Re: Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

#67

Post by throwaway2048 »

thiht wrote: post #63
pikzen wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, systemd/nspawn does not benefit from the hype Docker garners, despite being infinitely better. This industry is becoming more and more hype and cargo-cult driven, instead of making sane technological choices

>despite being infinitely better How and why? You're being condescending. I like Docker and if anything you make me not want to try systemd-nspawn with this attitude.

Great job proving the second part of what he said

Re: Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

#68

Post by [deleted] »

thiht wrote: post #63
pikzen wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, systemd/nspawn does not benefit from the hype Docker garners, despite being infinitely better. This industry is becoming more and more hype and cargo-cult driven, instead of making sane technological choices

>despite being infinitely better How and why? You're being condescending. I like Docker and if anything you make me not want to try systemd-nspawn with this attitude.

[deleted]

Re: Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

#69

Post by gerdesj »

oneplane wrote: post #14

This is starting to smell like a system on top of a system to fix something that could be fixed in the system. Kind-of like implementing a filesystem on top op a filesystem... or putting a database on a filesystem to run another filesystem inside the database, or using a webbrowser as a runtime instead of an operating system.

It's simply billed as the easiest way to run Docker, well: "The smallest, easiest way to run Docker in production at scale."

I might give it a crack based on that. If you are hell bent on running Docker then an equivalent of the Ubuntu minimal install seems a good way to start.

Re: Tiny Linux distro that runs the entire OS as Docker containers

#70

Post by zzzcpan »

gtirloni wrote: post #47
cookiecaper wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, I agree that both Docker and k8s (at some level, k8s probably had to have a lot of that complexity to interface with Docker) are overengineered, and that there are better containerization processes/runtimes. But I still don't think containers are what most people want. People need/want ultra-lightweight VMs with atomized state. NixOS looks promising but I haven't used it yet. It seems to give you a way to deter…

It seems deploying thousands of ultra-lightweight VMs with atomized state would still require an orchestration layer. I don't follow how that would remove complexity and/or improve stability.

Right, and this orchestration layer is supposed to be designed for resilience and stability from the start, because it's an architectural problem that cannot be fixed later without a complete redesign of everything. There is one such proven architecture - supervision trees and it addresses both problems: complexity and stability. VMs are not even necessary for this, nor are cloud platforms.
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