Hi, Guys! I’m learning docker and trying to find out what are “base” images that are available in docker? I know there are ubuntu/alpine/centos/debian but is there any other “pure base” images like this? And if yes - does it mean that all ever existed images inherit those “base” images?
Thanks!
The type of base images you refer to are started FROM scratch and typically consists of the minimum binaries, libraries, and configs that make up the os. They are usually the foundation for other images and are often frequently re-published to either reflect a new version, or just have the latest os package patches included.
If you don’t want to start of with an existing base image, you can create your own base image from scratch. There are plenty of blog posts that show how it’s done.
Though, now to complete the confusion: every image can be used as a base image to create an image based on it.
An image created from a base image, is bound to the exact image version (=identified by a sha256 digest) of the base image. In order to benefit from an updated base image, the custom image needs to be re-created based on the new image version (=sha256 digest).
I am not aware of any Docker Hub filter that helps to identify images created from scratch.