Possible to run containers at boot? And a networking question

[gctwnl]

I’m in an all-Mac environment and I want to start using Docker (finally also with a swarm with Docker processes on multiple Macs). I’m a newbie and I’ve been reading documentation and I’m left with a few questions for which I haven’t found answers yet. I’d be obliged if someone can answer them for me.

1. I want containers to run at launch of the machine and not just when a user is logged in. From the documentation this looks to be incompatible with the Docker for Mac app, where all the documentation talks about ~/Library, etc. and everything seems to be about only running stuff when you’re logged in and have started the Docker for Mac app. Does this mean I will have to run Docker using the brew install? Or is it possible to have a Docker for Mac install and still use Docker containers without anyone being logged in?
2. I want containers to be active on a local subnet. I’ve read that you cannot connect to containers from the macOS host Docker is running on. Is this final, or is it just a matter of the right routing table command and such? What is needed for containers on a Mac to be first class citizens on my local LAN?

[gctwnl]

Nobody? I’ve installed Docker through homebrew and have found out that apparently code signing stops launchd from starting a docker-machine at boot. It would be really nice if I could run a docker machine at boot and also start some containers at boot.

[geedon]

If you want your containers running all the time after a reboot then I would look at docker-compose this appears to work fine with a mac, not that I have any experience with macs.

Create a common network 'docker network create [some_network_name] ’ and then, instead of using docker run to start containers you would instead be using docker-compose.yml files which use a structured file to define paramaters such as volume mounts and environment variables. Also, the network to be used and any aliases.

Example: -

version: "3"
services:
  nginx:
    image: "jwilder/nginx-proxy:alpine" 
    container_name: nginx
    restart: always 
    volumes:
      - /var/run/docker.sock:/tmp/docker.sock:ro
      - ./nginx/log:/var/log/nginx/
      - ./nginx/certs:/etc/nginx/certs
      - ./nginx/proxy.conf:/etc/nginx/proxy.conf:ro
    environment:
      - SSL_POLICY=Mozilla-Modern
    ports:
      - '80:80'
      - '443:443'
    networks:
      some_network:
        aliases:
          - nginx.local

    networks:
      some_network:
        external:
          name: some_network

As far as I’m aware, assuming docker starts up when your machine boots, the assuming you started the docker containers using ‘docker-compose up -d’, in the same directory as the docker-compose.yml file, then these containers will spin up on boot. There’s also a restart: always option incase of crashes.

[gctwnl]

That is the second part. The first part is getting a docker-machine run at boot of the Mac, the “assuming docker starts up when your machine boots” part. That’s the one I haven’t been able to get running.

The codesign thing turned out to be a red herring, by the way. It’s just not possible to get a docker machine start running at boot time via launchd.

[gctwnl]

Actually, it is possible. The problem is that launchd has no mechanism for an ordering of what to launch at boot, no dependencies. And docker-machine launches are dependent on Virtualbox kernel extensions having loaded.

So, I wrote a script to handle docker-machine at launch (and in general) and now I can launch docker-machines at boot time of a mac. I’m still expanding on the script to handle more issues and when it’s done I’ll publish in full.