6 ms·

Is there any practical benefit of Podman over Docker on a Mac? Virtual machine is still needed, so any performance issues are likely to persist (well, maybe Doc

by suchar 5y ago

Is there any practical benefit of Podman over Docker on a Mac? Virtual machine is still needed, so any performance issues are likely to persist (well, maybe Docker for Mac is a bit more buggy, but we can manually setup Docker instead of Podman in a similar way). Also, I think we are losing here access to the Docker socket on the host (inside the virtual machine it can be emulated using docker-podman).

Spivak 5y ago
Not having to pay Docker Inc to use it is the big advantage along with the security that comes with a solution that isn’t the meal ticket of the company that makes it so it will likely live on community supported for a long time.
- afarrell 5y ago
  What is podman’s revenue model? I am perplexed by the conclusion that charging enterprise customers $5/user-month makes the product’s future less secure.
  - mweberxyz 5y ago
    podman has no revenue model, it is an open source project managed by https://github.com/containers https://github.com/containers
    - afarrell 5y ago
      So without a revenue model, how would they pay someone to maintain it if the current maintainer[s] need to focus on family or paying their mortgage?
      - nemothekid 5y ago
        When I last looked into it, I came away with the feeling that github.com/containers is pretty much RedHat without any official backing.
        Spivak 5y ago
        That’s how Red Hat operates mostly. Time will tell if IBM royally messes this up but Red Hat is an upstream first company. If they need something they will put up the developer time but it will be a community project first that they repackage for RHEL. Red Hat’s secret sauce so to speak is the stupid amount of ongoing work it takes to actually maintain a distro, not the software itself.
        mohanmcgeek 5y ago
        > Red Hat is an upstream first company So is IBM from what I've seen. IBM + RedHat have more contributors working on OSS than Google, surprisingly.
      - JeremyNT 5y ago
        It's from RedHat/IBM. They can give this stuff away to developers because they just want to sell OpenShift to deep pocketed Enterprise customers. And really podman is strategically a defensive move so their Enterprise offerings aren't stuck depending on Docker Inc. Contrast with Docker, whose business is explicitly focused on "developer tools."
        nprateem 5y ago
        So podman is funded ultimately by enterprises which is OK, but now docker wants to fund their products by enterprises that's a problem for some reason... I could understand this if they were turning the thumbscrews on individuals but all this talk of switching sounds petty and silly and will probably be false economy
        chousuke 5y ago
        I suspect it's the bait-and-switch approach that annoys people. Podman (and RHEL, through community rebuilds) is free to use even for enterprises; you don't pay for the software itself, you pay for support.
        znpy 5y ago
        The problem is that red hat wants to monetize on "the big stuff" that is enterprise level software with support, subscription and consulting. Docker Inc wants to monetize on the basic stuff (e.g. a dumb desktop UI)
        bloopernova 5y ago
        Exactly, and lots of developers don't need a desktop UI. They just want something that sits in the background and gets out of their way.
        znpy 5y ago
        Yep. That's why docker inc is mostly failing and has to come up with this dumb stuff whereas red hat is thriving :)
  - Spivak 5y ago
    Because the future of the product now depends on the enterprise customers paying enough for it to not only fund the development but also fund the business backing it. OSS works best when software is needed by many different enterprises that all need it for their business but it isn’t a direct revenue generator. Because then the future is guaranteed since all of those enterprises will contribute patches and it makes financial sense for any of them to take on the maintainership. Docker Desktop has always been a single point of failure in development terms not being OSS, but the community of users just got slashed not that there’s a price tag attached to it and by charging Docker has basically said that the future of the product now depends on it turning a profit instead of before when it only depended on Docker Inc overall turning a profit.
    - nprateem 5y ago
      No idea how you came to that conclusion. Do you really think they'll survive without a way of using docker on Macs ? This is an extra revenue stream
- yunohn 5y ago
  > Not having to pay Docker Inc to use it is the big advantage It’s mind boggling to me how much HN refuses to pay (only for company licensing) for the innovation that is Docker, and would rather find alternatives to the tooling around it. > solution that isn’t the meal ticket of the company Usually I’ve seen arguments the other way around - X will do a good job /because/ it’s their core offering.
  - suction 5y ago
    When software companies switch to subscription-only models (see 1Password) you better not be invested in the software too much or you'll be at their price gouging mercy. I'll happily pay for software but I won't support subscription-based models, ever.
    - yunohn 5y ago
      You’re conflating consumer and corporate purchasing. By and far, companies prefer subscription based pricing that comes with ongoing support. Consumers also want support and updates, but have an irrational desire to not pay the company/people that provide it…
gizdan 5y ago
Podman does have a socket that can be started. I use it on Linux so I'm not sure how that works on MacOS but it's API is Docker compatible, thus works with the docker cli and docker-compose as well.
- mroche 5y ago
  IIRC the podman socket is a planned thing for macOS as it'll be necessary for certain features that rely on the docker socket and don't use SSH, such as VSCode's Remote Containers extension. However you can create an SSH tunnel to create the socket locally to allow non-podman clients to utilize the socket over SSH with the DOCKER_HOST environment variable. # Get URI > podman system connection ls # Create tunnel > ssh -nNT -L/tmp/podman.sock:/run/user/1000/podman/podman.sock -i ~/.ssh/podman-machine-default ssh://core@localhost:[PORT] # Export socket location > export DOCKER_HOST='/tmp/podman.sock' https://github.com/containers/podman/issues/11462 https://github.com/containers/podman/issues/11462 https://github.com/containers/podman/issues/11397 https://github.com/containers/podman/issues/11397
  - conanoc 5y ago
    Socket location is wrong. Use this: export DOCKER_HOST='unix:///tmp/podman.sock'
- znpy 5y ago
  The podman socket can be used to connect stuff to podman. For example, a GUI program or even docker-compose. However I must admit that I'm having serious troubles with podman+docker-compose (rhel 8.4, podman 3.2.3) so I reverted to podman-compose (which is way lower in quality and completeness).
demarq 5y ago
As a typical mac user there is no practical benefit. Being on a Mac is so you can avoid lengthy configurations, scripts and commands and instead have something that just works and is seamlessly integrated. This is the opposite. You’d probably only want to go this route to make a statement about free open source software. But at that point you may as well run Linux
- tjscott 5y ago
  The Docker daemon (likely the HyperKit VM) on the Mac has a tendency to burn CPU cycles, even when there are no containers running. It's pretty common for it to sit at 10-20% of a core all day, and sometimes gets pegged at 100% until you quit. There are countless closed issues in the GitHub issue tracker [1] for similar issues, but the symptoms don't seem to go away for me or many of my colleagues. It's been a pretty awful experience on Mac for a long time, so any competition is surely welcome. [1] https://github.com/docker/for-mac/issues/3499 https://github.com/docker/for-mac/issues/3499
  - laurencerowe 5y ago
    I had the same frustrations until the other day I saw a tip to enable 'Use the new Virtualization framework' under Preferences -> Experimental Features. Since then Docker's background CPU usage has dropped to 1% and I no longer bother stopping it when I'm not using it.
    - lugged 5y ago
      Wow, Mac users put up with some bullshit to avoid configuration and have things "just [sometimes, unless you're holding it wrong] work"
      - q-rews 5y ago
        I'm happy your platform of choice has no bugs nor quirks. Could you let us know which one it is? We can probably help you find the bullshit you put up with that has become second nature.

by suchar 5y ago

Spivak 5y ago

Not having to pay Docker Inc to use it is the big advantage along with the security that comes with a solution that isn’t the meal ticket of the company that makes it so it will likely live on community supported for a long time.

afarrell 5y ago
What is podman’s revenue model? I am perplexed by the conclusion that charging enterprise customers $5/user-month makes the product’s future less secure.
- mweberxyz 5y ago
  podman has no revenue model, it is an open source project managed by https://github.com/containers https://github.com/containers
  - afarrell 5y ago
    So without a revenue model, how would they pay someone to maintain it if the current maintainer[s] need to focus on family or paying their mortgage?
    - nemothekid 5y ago
      When I last looked into it, I came away with the feeling that github.com/containers is pretty much RedHat without any official backing.
      - Spivak 5y ago
        That’s how Red Hat operates mostly. Time will tell if IBM royally messes this up but Red Hat is an upstream first company. If they need something they will put up the developer time but it will be a community project first that they repackage for RHEL. Red Hat’s secret sauce so to speak is the stupid amount of ongoing work it takes to actually maintain a distro, not the software itself.
        mohanmcgeek 5y ago
        > Red Hat is an upstream first company So is IBM from what I've seen. IBM + RedHat have more contributors working on OSS than Google, surprisingly.
    - JeremyNT 5y ago
      It's from RedHat/IBM. They can give this stuff away to developers because they just want to sell OpenShift to deep pocketed Enterprise customers. And really podman is strategically a defensive move so their Enterprise offerings aren't stuck depending on Docker Inc. Contrast with Docker, whose business is explicitly focused on "developer tools."
      - nprateem 5y ago
        So podman is funded ultimately by enterprises which is OK, but now docker wants to fund their products by enterprises that's a problem for some reason... I could understand this if they were turning the thumbscrews on individuals but all this talk of switching sounds petty and silly and will probably be false economy
        chousuke 5y ago
        I suspect it's the bait-and-switch approach that annoys people. Podman (and RHEL, through community rebuilds) is free to use even for enterprises; you don't pay for the software itself, you pay for support.
        znpy 5y ago
        The problem is that red hat wants to monetize on "the big stuff" that is enterprise level software with support, subscription and consulting. Docker Inc wants to monetize on the basic stuff (e.g. a dumb desktop UI)
        bloopernova 5y ago
        Exactly, and lots of developers don't need a desktop UI. They just want something that sits in the background and gets out of their way.
        znpy 5y ago
        Yep. That's why docker inc is mostly failing and has to come up with this dumb stuff whereas red hat is thriving :)
- Spivak 5y ago
  Because the future of the product now depends on the enterprise customers paying enough for it to not only fund the development but also fund the business backing it. OSS works best when software is needed by many different enterprises that all need it for their business but it isn’t a direct revenue generator. Because then the future is guaranteed since all of those enterprises will contribute patches and it makes financial sense for any of them to take on the maintainership. Docker Desktop has always been a single point of failure in development terms not being OSS, but the community of users just got slashed not that there’s a price tag attached to it and by charging Docker has basically said that the future of the product now depends on it turning a profit instead of before when it only depended on Docker Inc overall turning a profit.
  - nprateem 5y ago
    No idea how you came to that conclusion. Do you really think they'll survive without a way of using docker on Macs ? This is an extra revenue stream
yunohn 5y ago
> Not having to pay Docker Inc to use it is the big advantage It’s mind boggling to me how much HN refuses to pay (only for company licensing) for the innovation that is Docker, and would rather find alternatives to the tooling around it. > solution that isn’t the meal ticket of the company Usually I’ve seen arguments the other way around - X will do a good job /because/ it’s their core offering.
- suction 5y ago
  When software companies switch to subscription-only models (see 1Password) you better not be invested in the software too much or you'll be at their price gouging mercy. I'll happily pay for software but I won't support subscription-based models, ever.
  - yunohn 5y ago
    You’re conflating consumer and corporate purchasing. By and far, companies prefer subscription based pricing that comes with ongoing support. Consumers also want support and updates, but have an irrational desire to not pay the company/people that provide it…

gizdan 5y ago

Podman does have a socket that can be started. I use it on Linux so I'm not sure how that works on MacOS but it's API is Docker compatible, thus works with the docker cli and docker-compose as well.

mroche 5y ago
IIRC the podman socket is a planned thing for macOS as it'll be necessary for certain features that rely on the docker socket and don't use SSH, such as VSCode's Remote Containers extension. However you can create an SSH tunnel to create the socket locally to allow non-podman clients to utilize the socket over SSH with the DOCKER_HOST environment variable. # Get URI > podman system connection ls # Create tunnel > ssh -nNT -L/tmp/podman.sock:/run/user/1000/podman/podman.sock -i ~/.ssh/podman-machine-default ssh://core@localhost:[PORT] # Export socket location > export DOCKER_HOST='/tmp/podman.sock' https://github.com/containers/podman/issues/11462 https://github.com/containers/podman/issues/11462 https://github.com/containers/podman/issues/11397 https://github.com/containers/podman/issues/11397
- conanoc 5y ago
  Socket location is wrong. Use this: export DOCKER_HOST='unix:///tmp/podman.sock'
znpy 5y ago
The podman socket can be used to connect stuff to podman. For example, a GUI program or even docker-compose. However I must admit that I'm having serious troubles with podman+docker-compose (rhel 8.4, podman 3.2.3) so I reverted to podman-compose (which is way lower in quality and completeness).

demarq 5y ago

As a typical mac user there is no practical benefit. Being on a Mac is so you can avoid lengthy configurations, scripts and commands and instead have something that just works and is seamlessly integrated. This is the opposite. You’d probably only want to go this route to make a statement about free open source software. But at that point you may as well run Linux

tjscott 5y ago
The Docker daemon (likely the HyperKit VM) on the Mac has a tendency to burn CPU cycles, even when there are no containers running. It's pretty common for it to sit at 10-20% of a core all day, and sometimes gets pegged at 100% until you quit. There are countless closed issues in the GitHub issue tracker [1] for similar issues, but the symptoms don't seem to go away for me or many of my colleagues. It's been a pretty awful experience on Mac for a long time, so any competition is surely welcome. [1] https://github.com/docker/for-mac/issues/3499 https://github.com/docker/for-mac/issues/3499
- laurencerowe 5y ago
  I had the same frustrations until the other day I saw a tip to enable 'Use the new Virtualization framework' under Preferences -> Experimental Features. Since then Docker's background CPU usage has dropped to 1% and I no longer bother stopping it when I'm not using it.
  - lugged 5y ago
    Wow, Mac users put up with some bullshit to avoid configuration and have things "just [sometimes, unless you're holding it wrong] work"
    - q-rews 5y ago
      I'm happy your platform of choice has no bugs nor quirks. Could you let us know which one it is? We can probably help you find the bullshit you put up with that has become second nature.