Docker on FreeBSD

Docker can be installed on FreeBSD starting from version 11. Docker needs the following pre-requisites to be installed on a FreeBSD 11 machine. FreeBSD 11 is in development stage as of 28/07/2015. FreeBSD development images can be downloaded from the following link. Here I have chosen AMD64 architecture. The image is build released on 16/7/2015.

ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/snapshots/amd64/amd64/ISO-IMAGES/11.0/FreeBSD-11.0-CURRENT-amd64-20150716-r285616-disc1.iso

Start the installation by booting off the CD. While installing, choose the root partition to be installed on ZFS file system. If you want to use UFS as the root partition, then ZFS partition has to be created separately. Install Docker and dependencies using the following command.

pkg install docker-freebsd ca_root_nss

Enable Docker service.

sysrc -f /etc/rc.conf docker_enable="YES"

Start Docker service.

service docker start

Once Docker service is installed, check the version using the following command.

docker version

The output will be like this.

Client version: 1.7.0-dev
Client API version: 1.19
Go version (client): go1.4.2
Git commit (client): 582db78
OS/Arch (client): freebsd/amd64
Server version: 1.7.0-dev
Server API version: 1.19
Go version (server): go1.4.2
Git commit (server): 582db78
OS/Arch (server): freebsd/amd64

Search the Docker repository for images of any operating system, for example FreeBSD.

docker search freebsd

The output will be like this.

NAME                            DESCRIPTION                                   STARS OFFICIAL  AUTOMATED
kazuyoshi/freebsd-minimal                                                     1                    
roobixx/docker-dg               DansGuardian is an award winning Open Sour... 1                    [OK]
lexaguskov/freebsd              FreeBSD operating system                      0                    
mattboll/freebsd                testing freebsd images                        0                    
jamesandariese/go-freebsd-amd64                                               0                    [OK]
jamesandariese/go-freebsd-386                                                 0                    [OK]
jamesandariese/go-freebsd-arm                                                 0                    [OK]

Choose one of these images. If you choose “lexaguskov/freebsd” for example, use the following command to pull this image from the repository.

docker pull lexaguskov/freebsd

Once the image has been pulled from the repository, use the following command to list the images.

docker images

The output will be like this.

REPOSITORY           TAG                 IMAGE ID            CREATED             VIRTUAL SIZE
lexaguskov/freebsd   latest              4e791e7444fe        8 weeks ago         302.9 MB

Run the pulled Docker container using the following command.

docker run -t -i lexaguskov/freebsd /bin/csh

Now from another terminal you can view the list of running containers using the following command.

docker ps

The output will be like this.

CONTAINER ID        IMAGE                COMMAND             CREATED              STATUS              PORTS               NAMES
7a100c87a482        lexaguskov/freebsd   "/bin/csh"          About a minute ago   Up About a minute                       hungry_poincare

You can stop the container by typing the following command from inside the container.

exit

You can also pull Linux images and run Linux containers. For example, you can search for Ubuntu images.

docker search ubuntu

The output will be like this

NAME                             DESCRIPTION                                     STARS     OFFICIAL   AUTOMATED
ubuntu                           Ubuntu is a Debian-based Linux operating s...   1983      [OK]       
ubuntu-upstart                   Upstart is an event-based replacement for ...   28        [OK]       
torusware/speedus-ubuntu         Always updated official Ubuntu docker imag...   25                   [OK]
dorowu/ubuntu-desktop-lxde-vnc   Ubuntu with openssh-server and NoVNC on po...   17                   [OK]
tleyden5iwx/ubuntu-cuda          Ubuntu 14.04 with CUDA drivers pre-installed    16                   [OK]
ubuntu-debootstrap               debootstrap --variant=minbase --components...   11        [OK]       
neurodebian                      NeuroDebian provides neuroscience research...   10        [OK]       
guilhem/vagrant-ubuntu                                                           9                    [OK]
rastasheep/ubuntu-sshd           Dockerized SSH service, built on top of of...   4                    [OK]
fike/ubuntu-postgresql           PostgreSQL 9.4 beta until 9.0 version runn...   4                    [OK]
n3ziniuka5/ubuntu-oracle-jdk     Ubuntu with Oracle JDK. Check tags for ver...   3                    [OK]
sameersbn/ubuntu                                                                 3                    [OK]
armbuild/ubuntu-debootstrap      ARMHF port of ubuntu-debootstrap                2                    [OK]
nuagebec/ubuntu                  Simple always updated Ubuntu docker images...   2                    [OK]
maxexcloo/ubuntu                 Docker base image built on Ubuntu with Sup...   2                    [OK]
nimmis/ubuntu                    This is a docker images different LTS vers...   2                    [OK]
cpuguy83/ubuntu                                                                  1                    [OK]
seetheprogress/ubuntu            Ubuntu image provided by seetheprogress us...   1                    [OK]
alsanium/ubuntu                  Ubuntu Core image for Docker                    1                    [OK]
densuke/ubuntu-jp-remix          Ubuntu Linuxの日本語remix風味です                  1                    [OK]
sylvainlasnier/ubuntu            Ubuntu 15.04 root docker images with commo...   1                    [OK]
partlab/ubuntu                   Simple Ubuntu docker images.                    0                    [OK]
zoni/ubuntu                                                                      0                    [OK]
envygeeks/ubuntu                 Updated Ubuntu (latest.)                        0                    [OK]
densuke/ubuntu-supervisor        densuke/ubuntu-jp-remix:trusty 上で supe...      0                    [OK]

Pull the first Linux container “ubuntu” using the following command.

docker pull ubuntu

Once the container image is pulled, it can be run using the following command.

docker run -t -i ubuntu /bin/bash