Understanding the key differences between LXC and Docker

jeremy · 09-12-2014, 11:50 AM

Quote:

Linux containers (LXC) has the potential to transform how we run and scale applications. Container technology is not new, mainstream support in the vanilla kernel however is, paving the way for widespread adoption.

FreeBSD has Jails, Solaris has Zones and there are other container technologies like OpenVZ and Linux VServer that depend on custom kernels impeding adoption.

There is an excellent presentation on the history and current state of Linux containers by Dr. Rami Rosen which provides fantastic perspective and context.

What’s the fuss?
Containers isolate and encapsulate your application workloads from the host system. Think of a container as an OS within your host OS in which you can install and run applications, and for all practical purposes behaves like an virtual machine.

This emulation is enabled by the Linux kernel and the LXC project which provides container OS templates for various distributions and user facing applications for container life cycle management.

Portability
Containers decouple your applications from the host OS, abstracts it and makes it portable across any system that supports LXC. That this is useful would be a wild understatement. Users can have a clean and minimal base Linux OS and run everything else let’s say a lamp stack in a container.

More at flockport...

--jeremy