Best way to dockerize my application

General
1

We are trying to explore using docker in conjunction with windows azure to drive our costs down. I have been reading the official docker documentation and trying to consume all the info i can on docker, but im sure there is alot more to go.

Is there any link to best practices on how to dockerize your application?
Here is a bit of info about the app.
Persistent data resides in old school CISAM files – we are in the process of moving away from this but we are not there yet
MySQL holds a few pieces of persistent data, but mostly data that gets rebuilt on a nightly basis
Java/tomcat based front end of the application

Currently our system runs on CentOS/Redhat based linux machine, so obviously need to start there. Is there a better way to architect this other than taking a blank centos docker image and loading all our goodies in it.

I am sure this is a super newb question, so if anyone has some great resources to point to that would be great. Just trying to learn all I can. Thanks.

2

Well since none of the experts responded I’ll give you my $.02 worth as I’m really new to docker also. First I would start with these videos https://www.docker.com/products/resources/video-tutorial and webinars https://www.docker.com/products/resources/webinars They helped me a lot. But I don’t think it’s a straight forward answer to your question as it depends on existing system architecture.
Now I’m looking at docker to do something similar to you as looking to dockerize existing systems but my reasons are for increased security. So guidance from one of the videos was to dockerize all network facing processes. So looks like you have some tomcat well that is pretty straight forward from what I’m finding to dockerize existing web services. I woudl also setup a registry: https://docs.docker.com/registry/deploying/

Frank