Today, we will See Docker Use Cases Tutorial. Moreover, we will look at for whom Docker is useful. Also, we will see when to use Docker and when not to use Docker. Along with this, we will look at the reason why Docker is useful. 

So, let’s start the Docker Use Cases Tutorial.

Who is Docker for?

On defining Docker, it is a tool which is designed to advantage both developers and system administrators, by making it a part of many DevOps toolchains.

For developers

Docker helps to focus on writing code even without worrying about the system that it will ultimately be running on. Moreover, it permits developers to get a head start by using one of the thousands of programs already designed to run in a Docker container as a part of their application.

For operations staff

Docker potentially reduces the number of systems needed and also offers gives flexibility due to its small footprint and lower overhead.

Why is Docker Useful?

i. Fast, consistent delivery of your applications

By allowing developers to work in standardized environments, Docker streamlines the development lifecycle, with the help of local containers that offer our applications and services as well. Moreover, for continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) workflows, containers are great.

ii. Responsive deployment and scaling

Furthermore, the container-based platform of Docker permits for highly portable workloads. Its containers can run on several platforms like,  on physical or virtual machines in a data center, on a developer’s local laptop, on cloud providers, or also in a mixture of environments.

In addition, due to the lightweight nature and portability of Docker, it is easy to manage workloads dynamically, scaling up or tearing down applications and services in near real time.

iii. Running more workloads on the same hardware

Docker offers a viable, cost-effective alternative to hypervisor-based virtual machines because of its fast and lightweight nature, therefore we can use much of our compute capacity to achieve our business goals.

Also, we can say, for high-density environments as well as for small and medium deployments especially where we need to do more with fewer resources, Docker is perfect a right choice.

When to Use Docker?

Here we are listing some scenarios where we can use Docker:

i. Learning new technologies

Docker offers an isolated and disposable environment to get started with a new tool without spending time on installation and configuration. There are many projects which maintain Docker images with their applications those are already installed and configured.

ii. Basic use cases

If your application is basic or standard enough to work with a default Docker image, Pulling images from Docker Hub is also a good solution.

There are some cases like using a reverse proxy, hosting a website using a LAMP stack, or setting up a Minecraft server often have an official or well-supported image present on the DockerHub.

iii. App isolation

keeping the components of each application in separate containers will prevent problems with dependency management if we want to run multiple applications on one server.

iv. Developer teams

Docker provides a convenient way to have local development environments that closely match the production environment, if you have developers working with different setups, even without needing to ssh into a remote box.

Docker Use Cases

Now we are listing some of the Docker Use Cases which offers a consistent environment at low overhead by enabling technology of Docker:

Docker Use Cases

i. Simplifying Configuration

Simplifying configuration is the primary use case of Docker. As VMs offers the ability to run any platform with its own config on top of our infrastructure, Docker also offers this same capability even without the overhead of a virtual machine.

In addition, it helps to run our applications over multiple IaaS/PaaS even without any extra tweaks. From Amazon to Google, every IaaS/PaaS provider supports Docker now.

ii. Code Pipeline Management

Docker eases the code development and deployment pipeline and offers a consistent environment for the application from dev through production.

iii. Multi-tenancy

It is possible to use Docker in multi-tenant applications.

Basically, it was easy and inexpensive to create isolated environments using Docker especially for running multiple instances of app tiers for each tenant.

iv. Developer Productivity

Basically, we need to achieve two major goals, in the development environment. First, we need the development environment to be as close as possible to produce. And, secondly,  we need the development environment to be as fast as possible for the interactive purpose.

In order to attain the first goal, it is must that every service runs on its own VM to reflect how the production application runs. The low overhead of Docker easily permits a few dozen services to run inside different containers on the development environment that generally has a low memory capacity.

Further, to attain the next goal, we make use of docker’s shared volumes to make the application code available to the container from the host OS.

As a result, the developer is allowed to edit the source code from his platform & editor of choice and also is able to see the changes right away as the applications run with the help of same source code by running environment set inside the Docker container.

v. Server Consolidation

One of the Docker abilities, “The application isolation” permits consolidating multiple servers to save on cost even without the memory footprint of multiple OSes as well as the ability to share unused memory across the instances. Well as compared to VMs, Docker offers far denser server consolidation.

vi. Debugging Capabilities

There are many tools offered by Docker which are not necessarily specific to containers, yet, they work well with the concept of containers, like the ability to checkpoint containers and container versions, and also to diff two containers that are very useful in fixing an application.

vii. Rapid Deployment

It is possible to create Docker containers in milliseconds. This is not achieved by booting up an OS but by creating containers and just running the application process.

And, since  Docker images are immutable in nature they ensure us the peace of mind that things will work exactly the way they have been working or exactly they are supposed to work.

When Not to Use Docker?

Well, we can’t say that Docker is always the best solution because there are also times when it’s not. Few of those cases are:

i. Complicated  app and no sysadmin

Basically, using a pre-made Dockerfile or pulling an existing image will not be sufficient for large or complicated applications. Because, editing, Building, and managing communication between multiple containers on multiple servers is quite a time-consuming task.

ii. Performance is critical to your application

When it comes to performance, Docker shines compared to virtual machines due to the reason that containers share the host kernel and do not emulate a full operating system. Although, it does impose performance costs.

Processes running on the native OS will run more quiet and fast in comparison to the process within a container. We may want to avoid Docker if we need to get the best possible performance out of your server.

iii. You don’t want upgrade hassles

As it is a new technology so some work is still under development. Hence, we might have to update versions frequently, to get new features.

iv. Security is critical to your application

Especially for more complicated applications, Docker’s containerization approach raises its own security challenges. So, it requires attention from an experienced security engineer, even if these issues are solvable.

v. Multiple operating systems

If you want to run or test the same application on different operating systems, we will need to use virtual machines instead of Docker, since Docker containers share the host computer’s operating system.

So, this was all in Docker Use Cases. Hope you like our explanation.

Conclusion

Hence, we have seen all the best Docker Use Cases in detail. Also, we have discussed Docker use cases where we should not use Docker. Although, if any doubt occurs regarding Docker Use Cases, please mention in the comment section.

We will definitely revert on that. Moreover, there are many more Docker articles in the queue, Keep Visiting, Keep Learning!