5 ms·

Still feels crappy what Docker did by being free since inception, becoming the standard and then springing license fees onto companies that couldn't migrate off

Still feels crappy what Docker did by being free since inception, becoming the standard and then springing license fees onto companies that couldn't migrate off of it in time. Hopefully, podman can solve "basic dcoker desktop" needs for most companies.

sbjs 3y ago
> businesses of fewer than than 250 employees AND less than $10 million in revenue Seems like they can afford it.
- dwattttt 3y ago
  To complete the context, both of those are required for free use of Docker Desktop; 250 employees and $1k revenue would still require you to license it. EDIT: https://docs.docker.com/subscription/desktop-license/ https://docs.docker.com/subscription/desktop-license/
  - throwawayit1234 3y ago
    That sounds like a bad business.
    - Apfel 3y ago
      Or a government organisation. Or a charity.
      - willsmith72 3y ago
        Having worked in government, I don't see why they should be excluded from paying. But I think a charity could fall under the 3rd one here. "Examples of freely permitted usage include: Personal projects with less than $10 million revenue per year Students and teachers (whether in an educational or professional setting) Research at not-for-profit institutions Personal contributions to non-commercial open source projects"
        Spooky23 3y ago
        Second that. The crazy t&c required by gov have to be accounted for.
      - Zetice 3y ago
        Not-for-profit institutions are exempt.
  - Barrin92 3y ago
    >250 employees and $1k revenue what is this, the world's most overstaffed lemonade stand?
    - sbjs 3y ago
      Rarely does an HN comment make me laugh. Well done.
  - colechristensen 3y ago
    Which is fine. 250 employees earning the median US wage is 11 million per year to the employee before all sorts of overhead so more like 20 million in wages per year.
    - dwattttt 3y ago
      While true, many businesses are not US or staffed by the median waged US employee
    - ElectricalUnion 3y ago
      250 employees earning the average AR wage (542400 ARS/year) is around 360000 USD per year. You can pay 10 average AR workers for the wage of a single US minimum wage worker.
      - DiggyJohnson 3y ago
        Respectfully, I had no idea what you were talking about without a few google searches. AR == Argentinian Peso 542k ARS == $1600 USD So I guess I’ll ask some questions: 1) Is the Argentinian software labor pool large and organized enough to be accessible to international firms? 2) Is this the average wage of a software developer in Argentina? Or some larger group? 3) Why is this relevant in this discussion?
        colechristensen 3y ago
        I worked with some great Argentine contractors some years ago, I understand there is a nontrivial offshoring software labor pool. There is a point that offshore contractors getting access to such software represents a ... larger proportion of compensation, especially among the several such SaaS per-user fees most tech companies will pay. But there's also a counterpoint... docker wants somewhere between $5 and $30 US dollars per month per user, yes this is annoying because the value doesn't seem to be there for docker desktop which is all most people want anyway... on the other hand it's not such a moral issue... it's not much money at all.
        ElectricalUnion 3y ago
- andrewmutz 3y ago
  > Seems like they can afford it. This is a low bar for ethical business practices. If lure people to my ecosystem with low prices and then jack them up later when the switching costs are high, it's fine if they can afford it? If the electric company jacked their rates by 10X for consumers who make over 100K a year would that be fine since "they can afford it"?
  - oofta-boofta 3y ago
    [dead]
  - memefrog 3y ago
    Yes, because they would lose all their customers to their competitors, which is exactly what has happened to Docker.
  - skinner927 3y ago
    Electric company is a bad comparison because they’re a utility and you usually can’t switch. If grocery store A started charging $30 for walking into the store, you better bet everyone’s gonna head to grocery store B.
lbourdages 3y ago
I've been using Rancher Desktop for the past 6 months and I haven't missed Docker Desktop a single time.
- stock_toaster 3y ago
  Anyone know how does it compares to podman desktop?
  - slimsag 3y ago
    I believe Rancher desktop has more of an out-of-the-box focus on Kubernetes, it uses Rancher's k3s and whatnot. Podman desktop treats k8s as more of an optional thing, e.g. you use Kind to create a cluster. Of course there are also organizational differences, Podman seems to be more of a community led open-source project whereas Rancher is ultimately trying to sell enterprise kubernetes management software. In my experience, k3s looks great on the surface but I ran into quite a few issues operating it in a single-node use case. If I was looking into this today, I'd definitely explore Podman/Kind instead.
    - stock_toaster 3y ago
      That’s good info. Thanks!
    - lbourdages 3y ago
      It's one checkbox to disable k3s, I don't need it as the rare times I need to test something in k8s I do it in the dev environment. The main rationale for using Rancher is that the CLI is the same as Docker. No modification to any script was needed. Podman might be better, I can't say, but for what I use it for it doesn't really matter.
hedora 3y ago
I’ve had good luck with ubuntu multipass as a docker desktop replacement on macos: https://ubuntu.com/blog/replacing-docker-desktop-on-windows-and-mac-with-multipass https://ubuntu.com/blog/replacing-docker-desktop-on-windows-... It runs on windows too.
Spooky23 3y ago
Yeah some of my colleagues missed the memo and we got the extortion attempt. The crazy thing is the part of the company that want you to pay the troll is not the same as the field sales. That’s probably the most noxious business model ever. I’ve dealt with 5-6 companies doing that, and whenever renewal/retention is a different sales organization, i spin up a company project to plan the exit strategy. The nickel and dime cost stuff is one thing, but the bigger problem is that these companies and products always decline.
- pigeonhole123 3y ago
  Aren’t most sales teams separate from customer success? Can you expand on this insight?
  - krmboya 3y ago
    Did you mean 'customer support'?
    - evilduck 3y ago
      Probably not. Customer success are teams dedicated to keeping customers happy and paying and finding ways to ensure that they remain customers. Customer support is typically who you contact when you don't have any leverage and encounter a problem. If you spend a million dollars a year on a contract, you will typically have someone you know by name and meet with regularly who will legitimately hear your feedback and work to resolve your problems.
      - satvikpendem 3y ago
        How is that not just another name for customer support? They're both kinds of support for the customer, even if one has a more palatable name. In my experience, one is simply an alias for the other, as the sibling commenter notes, I have not seen those two roles split out.
        3y ago
cosmojg 3y ago
Podman has been a very straightforward drop-in replacement for Docker at my company. Even if that didn't work out, things like Linux namespaces, chroot, bubblewrap, and so on are all beautifully well-documented, battle-tested tools. Docker has no moat.
- JeremyNT 3y ago
  Well the Linux side has plenty of good alternatives and has had them for years, but good luck with MacOS or Windows users. Many of them just can't be bothered to understand how these technologies work. They just want an easy installer that lets them "run docker containers" and they don't want to even think about a Linux VM. Even many developers can't be bothered to deal with this stuff and just want some easy abstraction. This is where Docker Desktop has value and why some people will continue paying for it.
naikrovek 3y ago
Docker is still free. it is only Docker Desktop which is no longer free. most power users do not use or need Docker Desktop.
- phoenk 3y ago
  The desktop application is the easiest way to get up and running on Mac or Windows where a VM is necessary. Of course you can still set up docker engine manually in a VM, but even then it doesn't offer the same level of integration, like host mounts, Rosetta on Mac. Desktop Linux is the only environment where the desktop app offers little benefit over just running the engine.
  - gettodachoppa 3y ago
    I always forget there's people who do software development on something other than Linux. I mean I use Windows too (my laptop has poor Linux support, plus Proton wasn't a thing when I bought it so I went for something which is guaranteed to run games well). But I do all my development in a Linux VM in Virtualbox. If you have an SSD, performance is indistinguishable from native.
    - mcpeepants 3y ago
      > If you have an SSD, performance is indistinguishable from native. In my experience this is very much not the case. Running a graphical linux desktop in a VM on beefy hardware still introduces noticeable keypress latency for me, as an example.

sbjs 3y ago

> businesses of fewer than than 250 employees AND less than $10 million in revenue Seems like they can afford it.

dwattttt 3y ago
To complete the context, both of those are required for free use of Docker Desktop; 250 employees and $1k revenue would still require you to license it. EDIT: https://docs.docker.com/subscription/desktop-license/ https://docs.docker.com/subscription/desktop-license/
- throwawayit1234 3y ago
  That sounds like a bad business.
  - Apfel 3y ago
    Or a government organisation. Or a charity.
    - willsmith72 3y ago
      Having worked in government, I don't see why they should be excluded from paying. But I think a charity could fall under the 3rd one here. "Examples of freely permitted usage include: Personal projects with less than $10 million revenue per year Students and teachers (whether in an educational or professional setting) Research at not-for-profit institutions Personal contributions to non-commercial open source projects"
      - Spooky23 3y ago
        Second that. The crazy t&c required by gov have to be accounted for.
    - Zetice 3y ago
      Not-for-profit institutions are exempt.
- Barrin92 3y ago
  >250 employees and $1k revenue what is this, the world's most overstaffed lemonade stand?
  - sbjs 3y ago
    Rarely does an HN comment make me laugh. Well done.
- colechristensen 3y ago
  Which is fine. 250 employees earning the median US wage is 11 million per year to the employee before all sorts of overhead so more like 20 million in wages per year.
  - dwattttt 3y ago
    While true, many businesses are not US or staffed by the median waged US employee
  - ElectricalUnion 3y ago
    250 employees earning the average AR wage (542400 ARS/year) is around 360000 USD per year. You can pay 10 average AR workers for the wage of a single US minimum wage worker.
    - DiggyJohnson 3y ago
      Respectfully, I had no idea what you were talking about without a few google searches. AR == Argentinian Peso 542k ARS == $1600 USD So I guess I’ll ask some questions: 1) Is the Argentinian software labor pool large and organized enough to be accessible to international firms? 2) Is this the average wage of a software developer in Argentina? Or some larger group? 3) Why is this relevant in this discussion?
      - colechristensen 3y ago
        I worked with some great Argentine contractors some years ago, I understand there is a nontrivial offshoring software labor pool. There is a point that offshore contractors getting access to such software represents a ... larger proportion of compensation, especially among the several such SaaS per-user fees most tech companies will pay. But there's also a counterpoint... docker wants somewhere between $5 and $30 US dollars per month per user, yes this is annoying because the value doesn't seem to be there for docker desktop which is all most people want anyway... on the other hand it's not such a moral issue... it's not much money at all.
      - ElectricalUnion 3y ago
andrewmutz 3y ago
> Seems like they can afford it. This is a low bar for ethical business practices. If lure people to my ecosystem with low prices and then jack them up later when the switching costs are high, it's fine if they can afford it? If the electric company jacked their rates by 10X for consumers who make over 100K a year would that be fine since "they can afford it"?
- oofta-boofta 3y ago
  [dead]
- memefrog 3y ago
  Yes, because they would lose all their customers to their competitors, which is exactly what has happened to Docker.
- skinner927 3y ago
  Electric company is a bad comparison because they’re a utility and you usually can’t switch. If grocery store A started charging $30 for walking into the store, you better bet everyone’s gonna head to grocery store B.

lbourdages 3y ago

I've been using Rancher Desktop for the past 6 months and I haven't missed Docker Desktop a single time.

stock_toaster 3y ago
Anyone know how does it compares to podman desktop?
- slimsag 3y ago
  I believe Rancher desktop has more of an out-of-the-box focus on Kubernetes, it uses Rancher's k3s and whatnot. Podman desktop treats k8s as more of an optional thing, e.g. you use Kind to create a cluster. Of course there are also organizational differences, Podman seems to be more of a community led open-source project whereas Rancher is ultimately trying to sell enterprise kubernetes management software. In my experience, k3s looks great on the surface but I ran into quite a few issues operating it in a single-node use case. If I was looking into this today, I'd definitely explore Podman/Kind instead.
  - stock_toaster 3y ago
    That’s good info. Thanks!
  - lbourdages 3y ago
    It's one checkbox to disable k3s, I don't need it as the rare times I need to test something in k8s I do it in the dev environment. The main rationale for using Rancher is that the CLI is the same as Docker. No modification to any script was needed. Podman might be better, I can't say, but for what I use it for it doesn't really matter.

hedora 3y ago

I’ve had good luck with ubuntu multipass as a docker desktop replacement on macos: https://ubuntu.com/blog/replacing-docker-desktop-on-windows-and-mac-with-multipass https://ubuntu.com/blog/replacing-docker-desktop-on-windows-... It runs on windows too.

Spooky23 3y ago

Yeah some of my colleagues missed the memo and we got the extortion attempt. The crazy thing is the part of the company that want you to pay the troll is not the same as the field sales. That’s probably the most noxious business model ever. I’ve dealt with 5-6 companies doing that, and whenever renewal/retention is a different sales organization, i spin up a company project to plan the exit strategy. The nickel and dime cost stuff is one thing, but the bigger problem is that these companies and products always decline.

pigeonhole123 3y ago
Aren’t most sales teams separate from customer success? Can you expand on this insight?
- krmboya 3y ago
  Did you mean 'customer support'?
  - evilduck 3y ago
    Probably not. Customer success are teams dedicated to keeping customers happy and paying and finding ways to ensure that they remain customers. Customer support is typically who you contact when you don't have any leverage and encounter a problem. If you spend a million dollars a year on a contract, you will typically have someone you know by name and meet with regularly who will legitimately hear your feedback and work to resolve your problems.
    - satvikpendem 3y ago
      How is that not just another name for customer support? They're both kinds of support for the customer, even if one has a more palatable name. In my experience, one is simply an alias for the other, as the sibling commenter notes, I have not seen those two roles split out.
      - 3y ago

cosmojg 3y ago

Podman has been a very straightforward drop-in replacement for Docker at my company. Even if that didn't work out, things like Linux namespaces, chroot, bubblewrap, and so on are all beautifully well-documented, battle-tested tools. Docker has no moat.

JeremyNT 3y ago
Well the Linux side has plenty of good alternatives and has had them for years, but good luck with MacOS or Windows users. Many of them just can't be bothered to understand how these technologies work. They just want an easy installer that lets them "run docker containers" and they don't want to even think about a Linux VM. Even many developers can't be bothered to deal with this stuff and just want some easy abstraction. This is where Docker Desktop has value and why some people will continue paying for it.

naikrovek 3y ago

Docker is still free. it is only Docker Desktop which is no longer free. most power users do not use or need Docker Desktop.

phoenk 3y ago
The desktop application is the easiest way to get up and running on Mac or Windows where a VM is necessary. Of course you can still set up docker engine manually in a VM, but even then it doesn't offer the same level of integration, like host mounts, Rosetta on Mac. Desktop Linux is the only environment where the desktop app offers little benefit over just running the engine.
- gettodachoppa 3y ago
  I always forget there's people who do software development on something other than Linux. I mean I use Windows too (my laptop has poor Linux support, plus Proton wasn't a thing when I bought it so I went for something which is guaranteed to run games well). But I do all my development in a Linux VM in Virtualbox. If you have an SSD, performance is indistinguishable from native.
  - mcpeepants 3y ago
    > If you have an SSD, performance is indistinguishable from native. In my experience this is very much not the case. Running a graphical linux desktop in a VM on beefy hardware still introduces noticeable keypress latency for me, as an example.