Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Documentation

Containers

Containers are a lightweight and portable form of virtualization technology that allows applications and their dependencies to be packaged and run consistently across different environments. Containers provide isolated environments for each application, enabling them to run on any infrastructure without conflicts.

Containers are created from a base image, which is a pre-configured environment that includes the application code, libraries, and dependencies. When a container is run, it has access to the resources of the host system, such as CPU, memory, and storage, but it runs in an isolated environment, isolated from the host system and other containers.

Containers are often used in cloud computing and DevOps to enable faster and more efficient application deployment, scaling, and management. They provide a consistent runtime environment, which makes it easier to deploy applications across different environments, such as development, testing, and production.

Containers are typically managed by a container orchestration platform, such as Kubernetes, which automates deployment, scaling, and management of containerized applications.

Benefits of Containers

Containers have several benefits making them more useful for software development and deployment. Benefits are:

  • Portability: Containers can run consistently across different environments and perform exactly the same in environments such as development, testing and production. This makes it easier to move applications between platforms and infrastructures.
  • Efficiency: Containers are lightweight and contain the minimum needed OS components required to run applications. This makes it less memory and CPU intensive over traditional virtual machines.
  • Scalability: Containers can be spinned significantly faster than virtual machines during unpredictable demand for scale up, making it more scalable.
  • Consistency: Applications and all components are packaged together in containers. This makes it consistent and reproducible for running workloads.
  • Flexibility: Containers allow faster and frequent deployment for changes in applications. This lets you publish changes quickly.
  • Security: Containers provide isolation and improved security as each container runs in its own isolated environment. This reduces risk of conflicts and attacks.

Best practices for Containers

Using container best practices can help ensure optimal performance, security and scalability. Some best practices are:

  • Lightweight base image: Start with a lightweight base image for your container to reduce size and increase portability.
  • Small container: Leverage microservices architecture to break down applications into lightweight, independent components that can be deployed independently.
  • Orchestration: Use container orchestration platforms to automate deployment, scaling and management. Explore OKE.
  • Container registry: Use container registry to store container images to deploy and be pulled by container platforms for scaling and rolling updates.
  • Security: Secure your containers and don't use root user. Avoid hard coded passwords and secrets, and leverage platform integration to supply confidential configurations.
  • Optimize: Use container optimization tools and frameworks to maximize performance and reduce resource utilization. For example, you can use KEDA, DAPR, KNative, and so on.

How to Use Containers

Using containers involves the following steps:

  1. Create a container image. A container image is a pre-configured environment that includes the application code, libraries, and dependencies. You can create a container image using a tool such as Docker, or by using a pre-existing image as a starting point.
  2. Store the image. You can store the container image in a container registry, such as Docker Hub, where it can be easily accessed and reused by others.
  3. Run the container. You can run the container on a host system, such as a physical machine, virtual machine, or cloud instance. When a container is run, it has access to the resources of the host system, but runs in an isolated environment, isolated from the host system and other containers.
  4. Manage containers. You can manage containers using a container orchestration platform, such as Kubernetes, which automates deployment, scaling, and management of containerized applications.
  5. Deploy the containerized application. You can deploy the containerized application by running one or more containers on one or more host systems. You can configure the host systems and containers to meet your specific requirements, such as scaling, load balancing, and failover.

Note: Using containers requires an understanding of container technology and container orchestration. When using containers, you might also need to consider factors such as security, networking, and data management, in addition to the underlying infrastructure.

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