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38 lines
1.9 KiB
Plaintext
38 lines
1.9 KiB
Plaintext
// Module included in the following assemblies:
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// * openshift_images/images-understand.aodc
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[id="containers-about_{context}"]
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= Containers
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The basic units of {product-title} applications are called _containers_.
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link:https://access.redhat.com/articles/1353593[Linux container technologies]
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are lightweight mechanisms for isolating running processes so that they are
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limited to interacting with only their designated resources. The word
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container is defined as a specific running or paused instance of a container
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image.
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Many application instances can be running in containers on a single host without
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visibility into each others' processes, files, network, and so on. Typically,
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each container provides a single service, often called a micro-service, such
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as a web server or a database, though containers can be used for arbitrary
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workloads.
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The Linux kernel has been incorporating capabilities for container technologies
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for years. The Docker project developed a convenient management interface for
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Linux containers on a host. More recently, the
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link:https://github.com/opencontainers/[Open Container Initiative] has developed
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open standards for container formats and container runtimes. {product-title} and
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Kubernetes add the ability to orchestrate OCI- and Docker-formatted containers
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across multi-host installations.
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Though you do not directly interact with container runtimes when using
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{product-title}, understanding their capabilities and terminology is
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important for understanding their role in {product-title} and how your
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applications function inside of containers.
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Tools such as
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link:https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-us/red_hat_enterprise_linux_atomic_host/7/html-single/managing_containers/#using_podman_to_work_with_containers[podman]
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can be used to replace `docker` command-line tools for running and managing
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containers directly. Using `podman`, you can experiment with containers
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separately from {product-title}.
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