Bocker: Docker implemented in around 100 lines of Bash (2015)

The fact how simple it is to re-implement a large part of Docker because all it fundamentally is a bit of glue code to the kernel is the biggest problem Docker-the-company faced and still faces.

Where Docker adds real value is not (just) Docker Hub but Docker for Windows and Mac. The integrations offer a vastly superior experience than messing around with VirtualBox and Vagrant by hand (been there, done that) to achieve running Docker on one's development machine.

Docker Desktop on Mac is a handicapped, underprivileged mess. Docker cli for Mac with Colima is still underprivileged, but at least you can skip the bs license and Docker's gui. On Windows you can at least use Docker on WSL which works great. Why use Docker Desktop is beyond me.

> Why use Docker Desktop is beyond me.

I lived through a failed attempt to migrate from Docker Desktop for Mac to an open source alternative (minikube+portainer, IIRC). A lot of test scripts developers relied on – to run parts of the integration test suite on their laptops for debugging – broke, because Docker Desktop for Mac went to a lot of effort to make macOS look like you were running Docker on Linux, whereas the open source replacement wasn't as seamless. Some of these test scripts contained Java code directly talking to the Docker daemon over its Unix domain socket, so need the same API implemented. Many other scripts made heavy use of the Docker CLI. After spending a lot of time on it, it was decided to just go back to Docker Desktop for Mac. The failed migration had resulted in highly paid engineers spending time pulling their hair out trying to get test scripts to work instead of actually fixing bugs and delivering new features.

Now, that was 2+ years ago now, and maybe the open source alternatives have caught up since, or maybe we picked the wrong one or made some other mistake. But I'm not rushing to try it again.