https://docs.docker.com/engine/reference/commandline/run/#/configure-namespaced-kernel-parameters-sysctls-at-runtime
Run a command in a new container
$ docker run [OPTIONS] IMAGE [COMMAND] [ARG...]
Refer to the options section for an overview of available OPTIONS
for this command.
The docker run
command first creates
a writeable container layer over the specified image, and then starts
it using the specified command. That is, docker run
is equivalent to the API /containers/create
then /containers/(id)/start
. A stopped container can be restarted with all its previous changes intact using docker start
. See docker ps -a
to view a list of all containers.
For information on connecting a container to a network, see the “Docker network overview”.
For example uses of this command, refer to the examples section below.
Name, shorthand | Default | Description |
--add-host |
Add a custom host-to-IP mapping (host:ip) | |
--attach , -a |
Attach to STDIN, STDOUT or STDERR | |
--blkio-weight |
Block IO (relative weight), between 10 and 1000, or 0 to disable (default 0) | |
--blkio-weight-device |
Block IO weight (relative device weight) | |
--cap-add |
Add Linux capabilities | |
--cap-drop |
Drop Linux capabilities | |
--cgroup-parent |
Optional parent cgroup for the container | |
--cgroupns |
API 1.41+ Cgroup namespace to use (host|private) 'host': Run the container in the Docker host's cgroup namespace 'private': Run the container in its own private cgroup namespace '': Use the cgroup namespace as configured by the default-cgroupns-mode option on the daemon (default) |
|
--cidfile |
Write the container ID to the file | |
--cpu-count |
CPU count (Windows only) | |
--cpu-percent |
CPU percent (Windows only) | |
--cpu-period |
Limit CPU CFS (Completely Fair Scheduler) period | |
--cpu-quota |
Limit CPU CFS (Completely Fair Scheduler) quota | |
--cpu-rt-period |
Limit CPU real-time period in microseconds | |
--cpu-rt-runtime |
Limit CPU real-time runtime in microseconds | |
--cpu-shares , -c |
CPU shares (relative weight) | |
--cpus |
Number of CPUs | |
--cpuset-cpus |
CPUs in which to allow execution (0-3, 0,1) | |
--cpuset-mems |
MEMs in which to allow execution (0-3, 0,1) | |
--detach , -d |
Run container in background and print container ID | |
--detach-keys |
Override the key sequence for detaching a container | |
--device |
Add a host device to the container | |
--device-cgroup-rule |
Add a rule to the cgroup allowed devices list | |
--device-read-bps |
Limit read rate (bytes per second) from a device | |
--device-read-iops |
Limit read rate (IO per second) from a device | |
--device-write-bps |
Limit write rate (bytes per second) to a device | |
--device-write-iops |
Limit write rate (IO per second) to a device | |
--disable-content-trust |
true |
Skip image verification |
--dns |
Set custom DNS servers | |
--dns-opt |
Set DNS options | |
--dns-option |
Set DNS options | |
--dns-search |
Set custom DNS search domains | |
--domainname |
Container NIS domain name | |
--entrypoint |
Overwrite the default ENTRYPOINT of the image | |
--env , -e |
Set environment variables | |
--env-file |
Read in a file of environment variables | |
--expose |
Expose a port or a range of ports | |
--gpus |
API 1.40+ GPU devices to add to the container ('all' to pass all GPUs) |
|
--group-add |
Add additional groups to join | |
--health-cmd |
Command to run to check health | |
--health-interval |
Time between running the check (ms|s|m|h) (default 0s) | |
--health-retries |
Consecutive failures needed to report unhealthy | |
--health-start-period |
Start period for the container to initialize before starting health-retries countdown (ms|s|m|h) (default 0s) | |
--health-timeout |
Maximum time to allow one check to run (ms|s|m|h) (default 0s) | |
--help |
Print usage | |
--hostname , -h |
Container host name | |
--init |
Run an init inside the container that forwards signals and reaps processes | |
--interactive , -i |
Keep STDIN open even if not attached | |
--io-maxbandwidth |
Maximum IO bandwidth limit for the system drive (Windows only) | |
--io-maxiops |
Maximum IOps limit for the system drive (Windows only) | |
--ip |
IPv4 address (e.g., 172.30.100.104) | |
--ip6 |
IPv6 address (e.g., 2001:db8::33) | |
--ipc |
IPC mode to use | |
--isolation |
Container isolation technology | |
--kernel-memory |
Kernel memory limit | |
--label , -l |
Set meta data on a container | |
--label-file |
Read in a line delimited file of labels | |
--link |
Add link to another container | |
--link-local-ip |
Container IPv4/IPv6 link-local addresses | |
--log-driver |
Logging driver for the container | |
--log-opt |
Log driver options | |
--mac-address |
Container MAC address (e.g., 92:d0:c6:0a:29:33) | |
--memory , -m |
Memory limit | |
--memory-reservation |
Memory soft limit | |
--memory-swap |
Swap limit equal to memory plus swap: '-1' to enable unlimited swap | |
--memory-swappiness |
-1 |
Tune container memory swappiness (0 to 100) |
--mount |
Attach a filesystem mount to the container | |
--name |
Assign a name to the container | |
--net |
Connect a container to a network | |
--net-alias |
Add network-scoped alias for the container | |
--network |
Connect a container to a network | |
--network-alias |
Add network-scoped alias for the container | |
--no-healthcheck |
Disable any container-specified HEALTHCHECK | |
--oom-kill-disable |
Disable OOM Killer | |
--oom-score-adj |
Tune host's OOM preferences (-1000 to 1000) | |
--pid |
PID namespace to use | |
--pids-limit |
Tune container pids limit (set -1 for unlimited) | |
--platform |
Set platform if server is multi-platform capable | |
--privileged |
Give extended privileges to this container | |
--publish , -p |
Publish a container's port(s) to the host | |
--publish-all , -P |
Publish all exposed ports to random ports | |
--pull |
missing |
Pull image before running ("always"|"missing"|"never") |
--read-only |
Mount the container's root filesystem as read only | |
--restart |
no |
Restart policy to apply when a container exits |
--rm |
Automatically remove the container when it exits | |
--runtime |
Runtime to use for this container | |
--security-opt |
Security Options | |
--shm-size |
Size of /dev/shm | |
--sig-proxy |
true |
Proxy received signals to the process |
--stop-signal |
SIGTERM |
Signal to stop a container |
--stop-timeout |
Timeout (in seconds) to stop a container | |
--storage-opt |
Storage driver options for the container | |
--sysctl |
Sysctl options | |
--tmpfs |
Mount a tmpfs directory | |
--tty , -t |
Allocate a pseudo-TTY | |
--ulimit |
Ulimit options | |
--user , -u |
Username or UID (format: <name|uid>[:<group|gid>]) | |
--userns |
User namespace to use | |
--uts |
UTS namespace to use | |
--volume , -v |
Bind mount a volume | |
--volume-driver |
Optional volume driver for the container | |
--volumes-from |
Mount volumes from the specified container(s) | |
--workdir , -w |
Working directory inside the container |
$ docker run --name test -it debian
root@d6c0fe130dba:/# exit 13
$ echo $?
13
$ docker ps -a | grep test
d6c0fe130dba debian:7 "/bin/bash" 26 seconds ago Exited (13) 17 seconds ago test
This example runs a container named test
using the debian:latest
image. The -it
instructs Docker to allocate a pseudo-TTY connected to the container’s stdin; creating an interactive bash
shell in the container. In the example, the bash
shell is quit by entering exit 13
. This exit code is passed on to the caller of docker run
, and is recorded in the test
container’s metadata.
$ docker run --cidfile /tmp/docker_test.cid ubuntu echo "test"
This will create a container and print test
to the console. The cidfile
flag makes Docker attempt to create a new file and write the container ID to it. If the file exists already, Docker will return an error. Docker will close this file when docker run
exits.
$ docker run -t -i --rm ubuntu bash
root@bc338942ef20:/# mount -t tmpfs none /mnt
mount: permission denied
This will not work, because by default, most potentially dangerous kernel capabilities are dropped; including cap_sys_admin
(which is required to mount filesystems). However, the --privileged
flag will allow it to run:
$ docker run -t -i --privileged ubuntu bash
root@50e3f57e16e6:/# mount -t tmpfs none /mnt
root@50e3f57e16e6:/# df -h
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
none 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /mnt
The --privileged
flag gives all capabilities to the container, and it also lifts all the limitations enforced by the device
cgroup controller. In other words, the container can then do almost everything that the host can do. This flag exists to allow special use-cases, like running Docker within Docker.
$ docker run -w /path/to/dir/ -i -t ubuntu pwd
The -w
lets the command being executed inside directory given, here /path/to/dir/
. If the path does not exist it is created inside the container.
$ docker run -it --storage-opt size=120G fedora /bin/bash
This (size) will allow to set the container filesystem size to 120G at creation time. This option is only available for the devicemapper
, btrfs
, overlay2
, windowsfilter
and zfs
graph drivers. For the devicemapper
, btrfs
, windowsfilter
and zfs
graph drivers, user cannot pass a size less than the Default BaseFS Size. For the overlay2
storage driver, the size option is only available if the backing filesystem is xfs
and mounted with the pquota
mount option. Under these conditions, user can pass any size less than the backing filesystem size.
$ docker run -d --tmpfs /run:rw,noexec,nosuid,size=65536k my_image
The --tmpfs
flag mounts an empty tmpfs into the container with the rw
, noexec
, nosuid
, size=65536k
options.
$ docker run -v `pwd`:`pwd` -w `pwd` -i -t ubuntu pwd
The -v
flag mounts the current working directory into the container. The -w
lets the command being executed inside the current working directory, by changing into the directory to the value returned by pwd
. So this combination executes the command using the container, but inside the current working directory.
$ docker run -v /doesnt/exist:/foo -w /foo -i -t ubuntu bash
When the host directory of a bind-mounted volume doesn’t exist, Docker will automatically create this directory on the host for you. In the example above, Docker will create the /doesnt/exist
folder before starting your container.
$ docker run --read-only -v /icanwrite busybox touch /icanwrite/here
Volumes can be used in combination with --read-only
to control where a container writes files. The --read-only
flag mounts the container’s root filesystem as read only prohibiting writes to locations other than the specified volumes for the container.
$ docker run -t -i -v /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock -v /path/to/static-docker-binary:/usr/bin/docker busybox sh
By bind-mounting the Docker Unix socket and statically linked Docker binary (refer to get the Linux binary), you give the container the full access to create and manipulate the host’s Docker daemon.
On Windows, the paths must be specified using Windows-style semantics.
PS C:\> docker run -v c:\foo:c:\dest microsoft/nanoserver cmd /s /c type c:\dest\somefile.txt
Contents of file
PS C:\> docker run -v c:\foo:d: microsoft/nanoserver cmd /s /c type d:\somefile.txt
Contents of file
The following examples will fail when using Windows-based containers, as the destination of a volume or bind mount inside the container must be one of: a non-existing or empty directory; or a drive other than C:. Further, the source of a bind mount must be a local directory, not a file.
net use z: \\remotemachine\share
docker run -v z:\foo:c:\dest ...
docker run -v \\uncpath\to\directory:c:\dest ...
docker run -v c:\foo\somefile.txt:c:\dest ...
docker run -v c:\foo:c: ...
docker run -v c:\foo:c:\existing-directory-with-contents ...
For in-depth information about volumes, refer to manage data in containers
The --mount
flag allows you to mount volumes, host-directories and tmpfs
mounts in a container.
The --mount
flag supports most options that are supported by the -v
or the --volume
flag, but uses a different syntax. For in-depth information on the --mount
flag, and a comparison between --volume
and --mount
, refer to Bind mounts.
Even though there is no plan to deprecate --volume
, usage of --mount
is recommended.
Examples:
$ docker run --read-only --mount type=volume,target=/icanwrite busybox touch /icanwrite/here
$ docker run -t -i --mount type=bind,src=/data,dst=/data busybox sh
$ docker run -p 127.0.0.1:80:8080/tcp ubuntu bash
This binds port 8080
of the container to TCP port 80
on 127.0.0.1
of the host machine. You can also specify udp
and sctp
ports. The Docker User Guide explains in detail how to manipulate ports in Docker.
Note that ports which are not bound to the host (i.e., -p 80:80
instead of -p 127.0.0.1:80:80
) will be accessible from the outside. This also applies if you configured UFW to block this specific port, as Docker manages its own iptables rules. Read more
$ docker run --expose 80 ubuntu bash
This exposes port 80
of the container without publishing the port to the host system’s interfaces.
Use the --pull
flag to set the image pull policy when creating (and running) the container.
The --pull
flag can take one of these values:
Value | Description |
---|---|
missing (default) |
Pull the image if it was not found in the image cache, or use the cached image otherwise. |
never |
Do not pull the image, even if it’s missing, and produce an error if the image does not exist in the image cache. |
always |
Always perform a pull before creating the container. |
When creating (and running) a container from an image, the daemon checks if the image exists in the local image cache. If the image is missing, an error is returned to the CLI, allowing it to initiate a pull.
The default (missing
) is to only pull the image if it is not present in the daemon’s image cache. This default allows you to run images that only exist locally (for example, images you built from a Dockerfile, but that have not been pushed to a registry), and reduces networking.
The always
option always initiates a pull before creating the container. This option makes sure the image is up-to-date, and prevents you from using outdated images, but may not be suitable in situations where you want to test a locally built image before pushing (as pulling the image overwrites the existing image in the image cache).
The never
option disables (implicit) pulling images when creating containers, and only uses images that are available in the image cache. If the specified image is not found, an error is produced, and the container is not created. This option is useful in situations where networking is not available, or to prevent images from being pulled implicitly when creating containers.
The following example shows docker run
with the --pull=never
option set, which produces en error as the image is missing in the image-cache:
$ docker run --pull=never hello-world
docker: Error response from daemon: No such image: hello-world:latest.
$ docker run -e MYVAR1 --env MYVAR2=foo --env-file ./env.list ubuntu bash
Use the -e
, --env
, and --env-file
flags to set simple (non-array) environment variables in the container you’re running, or overwrite variables that are defined in the Dockerfile of the image you’re running.
You can define the variable and its value when running the container:
$ docker run --env VAR1=value1 --env VAR2=value2 ubuntu env | grep VAR
VAR1=value1
VAR2=value2
You can also use variables that you’ve exported to your local environment:
export VAR1=value1
export VAR2=value2
$ docker run --env VAR1 --env VAR2 ubuntu env | grep VAR
VAR1=value1
VAR2=value2
When running the command, the Docker CLI client checks the value the variable has in your local environment and passes it to the container. If no =
is provided and that variable is not exported in your local environment, the variable won’t be set in the container.
You can also load the environment variables from a file. This file should use the syntax <variable>=value
(which sets the variable to the given value) or <variable>
(which takes the value from the local environment), and #
for comments.
$ cat env.list
# This is a comment
VAR1=value1
VAR2=value2
USER
$ docker run --env-file env.list ubuntu env | grep -E 'VAR|USER'
VAR1=value1
VAR2=value2
USER=jonzeolla
A label is a key=value
pair that applies metadata to a container. To label a container with two labels:
$ docker run -l my-label --label com.example.foo=bar ubuntu bash
The my-label
key doesn’t specify a value so the label defaults to an empty string (""
). To add multiple labels, repeat the label flag (-l
or --label
).
The key=value
must be unique to avoid overwriting the label value. If you specify labels with identical keys but different values, each subsequent value overwrites the previous. Docker uses the last key=value
you supply.
Use the --label-file
flag to load multiple labels from a file. Delimit each label in the file with an EOL mark. The example below loads labels from a labels file in the current directory:
$ docker run --label-file ./labels ubuntu bash
The label-file format is similar to the format for loading environment variables. (Unlike environment variables, labels are not visible to processes running inside a container.) The following example illustrates a label-file format:
com.example.label1="a label"
# this is a comment
com.example.label2=another\ label
com.example.label3
You can load multiple label-files by supplying multiple --label-file
flags.
For additional information on working with labels, see Labels - custom metadata in Docker in the Docker User Guide.
When you start a container use the --network
flag to connect it to a network. The following commands create a network named my-net
, and adds a busybox
container to the my-net
network.
$ docker network create my-net
$ docker run -itd --network=my-net busybox
You can also choose the IP addresses for the container with --ip
and --ip6
flags when you start the container on a user-defined network.
$ docker run -itd --network=my-net --ip=10.10.9.75 busybox
If you want to add a running container to a network use the docker network connect
subcommand.
You can connect multiple containers to the same network. Once connected, the containers can communicate easily using only another container’s IP address or name. For overlay
networks or custom plugins that support multi-host connectivity, containers connected to the same multi-host network but launched from different Engines can also communicate in this way.
Note
The default bridge network only allow containers to communicate with each other using internal IP addresses. User-created bridge networks provide DNS resolution between containers using container names.
You can disconnect a container from a network using the docker network disconnect
command.
$ docker run --volumes-from 777f7dc92da7 --volumes-from ba8c0c54f0f2:ro -i -t ubuntu pwd
The --volumes-from
flag mounts all the defined volumes from the referenced containers. Containers can be specified by repetitions of the --volumes-from
argument. The container ID may be optionally suffixed with :ro
or :rw
to mount the volumes in read-only or read-write mode, respectively. By default, the volumes are mounted in the same mode (read write or read only) as the reference container.
Labeling systems like SELinux require that proper labels are placed on volume content mounted into a container. Without a label, the security system might prevent the processes running inside the container from using the content. By default, Docker does not change the labels set by the OS.
To change the label in the container context, you can add either of two suffixes :z
or :Z
to the volume mount. These suffixes tell Docker to relabel file objects on the shared volumes. The z
option tells Docker that two containers share the volume content. As a result, Docker labels the content with a shared content label. Shared volume labels allow all containers to read/write content. The Z
option tells Docker to label the content with a private unshared label. Only the current container can use a private volume.
The --attach
(or -a
) flag tells docker run
to bind to the container’s STDIN
, STDOUT
or STDERR
. This makes it possible to manipulate the output and input as needed.
$ echo "test" | docker run -i -a stdin ubuntu cat -
This pipes data into a container and prints the container’s ID by attaching only to the container’s STDIN
.
$ docker run -a stderr ubuntu echo test
This isn’t going to print anything unless there’s an error because we’ve only attached to the STDERR
of the container. The container’s logs still store what’s been written to STDERR
and STDOUT
.
$ cat somefile | docker run -i -a stdin mybuilder dobuild
This is a way of using --attach
to pipe a build file into a container. The container’s ID will be printed after the build is done and the build logs could be retrieved using docker logs
. This is useful if you need to pipe a file or something else into a container and retrieve the container’s ID once the container has finished running.
See also the docker cp
command.
$ docker run -it --rm \
--device=/dev/sdc:/dev/xvdc \
--device=/dev/sdd \
--device=/dev/zero:/dev/foobar \
ubuntu ls -l /dev/{xvdc,sdd,foobar}
brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 2 Feb 9 16:05 /dev/xvdc
brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 3 Feb 9 16:05 /dev/sdd
crw-rw-rw- 1 root root 1, 5 Feb 9 16:05 /dev/foobar
It is often necessary to directly expose devices to a container. The --device
option enables that. For example, a specific block storage device or loop device or audio device can be added to an otherwise unprivileged container (without the --privileged
flag) and have the application directly access it.
By default, the container will be able to read
, write
and mknod
these devices. This can be overridden using a third :rwm
set of options to each --device
flag. If the container is running in privileged mode, then the permissions specified will be ignored.
$ docker run --device=/dev/sda:/dev/xvdc --rm -it ubuntu fdisk /dev/xvdc
Command (m for help): q
$ docker run --device=/dev/sda:/dev/xvdc:r --rm -it ubuntu fdisk /dev/xvdc
You will not be able to write the partition table.
Command (m for help): q
$ docker run --device=/dev/sda:/dev/xvdc:rw --rm -it ubuntu fdisk /dev/xvdc
Command (m for help): q
$ docker run --device=/dev/sda:/dev/xvdc:m --rm -it ubuntu fdisk /dev/xvdc
fdisk: unable to open /dev/xvdc: Operation not permitted
Note
The
--device
option cannot be safely used with ephemeral devices. Block devices that may be removed should not be added to untrusted containers with--device
.
For Windows, the format of the string passed to the --device
option is in the form of --device=<IdType>/<Id>
. Beginning with Windows Server 2019 and Windows 10 October 2018 Update, Windows only supports an IdType of class
and the Id as a device interface class GUID. Refer to the table defined in the Windows container docs for a list of container-supported device interface class GUIDs.
If this option is specified for a process-isolated Windows container, all devices that implement the requested device interface class GUID are made available in the container. For example, the command below makes all COM ports on the host visible in the container.
PS C:\> docker run --device=class/86E0D1E0-8089-11D0-9CE4-08003E301F73 mcr.microsoft.com/windows/servercore:ltsc2019
Note
The
--device
option is only supported on process-isolated Windows containers. This option fails if the container isolation ishyperv
or when running Linux Containers on Windows (LCOW).
Devices available to a container are assigned at creation time. The assigned devices will both be added to the cgroup.allow file and created into the container once it is run. This poses a problem when a new device needs to be added to running container.
One of the solutions is to add a more permissive rule to a container allowing it access to a wider range of devices. For example, supposing our container needs access to a character device with major 42
and any number of minor number (added as new devices appear), the following rule would be added:
$ docker run -d --device-cgroup-rule='c 42:* rmw' -name my-container my-image
Then, a user could ask udev
to execute a script that would docker exec my-container mknod newDevX c 42 <minor>
the required device when it is added.
Note: initially present devices still need to be explicitly added to the
docker run
/docker create
command.
The --gpus
flag allows you to access NVIDIA GPU resources. First you need to install nvidia-container-runtime. Visit Specify a container’s resources for more information.
To use --gpus
, specify which GPUs (or all) to use. If no value is provided, all available GPUs are used. The example below exposes all available GPUs.
$ docker run -it --rm --gpus all ubuntu nvidia-smi
Use the device
option to specify GPUs. The example below exposes a specific GPU.
$ docker run -it --rm --gpus device=GPU-3a23c669-1f69-c64e-cf85-44e9b07e7a2a ubuntu nvidia-smi
The example below exposes the first and third GPUs.
$ docker run -it --rm --gpus '"device=0,2"' nvidia-smi
Use Docker’s --restart
to specify a container’s restart policy. A restart policy controls whether the Docker daemon restarts a container after exit. Docker supports the following restart policies:
Policy | Result |
---|---|
no |
Do not automatically restart the container when it exits. This is the default. |
on-failure[:max-retries] |
Restart only if the container exits with a non-zero exit status. Optionally, limit the number of restart retries the Docker daemon attempts. |
unless-stopped |
Restart the container unless it is explicitly stopped or Docker itself is stopped or restarted. |
always |
Always restart the container regardless of the exit status. When you specify always, the Docker daemon will try to restart the container indefinitely. The container will also always start on daemon startup, regardless of the current state of the container. |
$ docker run --restart=always redis
This will run the redis
container with a restart policy of always so that if the container exits, Docker will restart it.
More detailed information on restart policies can be found in the Restart Policies (--restart) section of the Docker run reference page.
You can add other hosts into a container’s /etc/hosts
file by using one or more --add-host
flags. This example adds a static address for a host named docker
:
$ docker run --add-host=docker:93.184.216.34 --rm -it alpine
/ # ping docker
PING docker (93.184.216.34): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 93.184.216.34: seq=0 ttl=37 time=93.052 ms
64 bytes from 93.184.216.34: seq=1 ttl=37 time=92.467 ms
64 bytes from 93.184.216.34: seq=2 ttl=37 time=92.252 ms
^C
--- docker ping statistics ---
4 packets transmitted, 4 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 92.209/92.495/93.052 ms
Sometimes you need to connect to the Docker host from within your container. To enable this, pass the Docker host’s IP address to the container using the --add-host
flag. To find the host’s address, use the ip addr show
command.
The flags you pass to ip addr show
depend on whether you are using IPv4 or IPv6 networking in your containers. Use the following flags for IPv4 address retrieval for a network device named eth0
:
$ HOSTIP=`ip -4 addr show scope global dev eth0 | grep inet | awk '{print $2}' | cut -d / -f 1 | sed -n 1p`
$ docker run --add-host=docker:${HOSTIP} --rm -it debian
For IPv6 use the -6
flag instead of the -4
flag. For other network devices, replace eth0
with the correct device name (for example docker0
for the bridge device).
Since setting ulimit
settings in a container requires extra privileges not available in the default container, you can set these using the --ulimit
flag. --ulimit
is specified with a soft and hard limit as such: <type>=<soft limit>[:<hard limit>]
, for example:
$ docker run --ulimit nofile=1024:1024 --rm debian sh -c "ulimit -n"
1024
Note
If you do not provide a
hard limit
, thesoft limit
is used for both values. If noulimits
are set, they are inherited from the defaultulimits
set on the daemon. Theas
option is disabled now. In other words, the following script is not supported:$ docker run -it --ulimit as=1024 fedora /bin/bash
The values are sent to the appropriate syscall
as they are set. Docker doesn’t perform any byte conversion. Take this into account when setting the values.
nproc
usageBe careful setting nproc
with the ulimit
flag as nproc
is designed by Linux to set the maximum number of processes available to a user, not to a container. For example, start four containers with daemon
user:
$ docker run -d -u daemon --ulimit nproc=3 busybox top
$ docker run -d -u daemon --ulimit nproc=3 busybox top
$ docker run -d -u daemon --ulimit nproc=3 busybox top
$ docker run -d -u daemon --ulimit nproc=3 busybox top
The 4th container fails and reports “[8] System error: resource temporarily unavailable” error. This fails because the caller set nproc=3
resulting in the first three containers using up the three processes quota set for the daemon
user.
The --stop-signal
flag sets the system call signal that will be sent to the container to exit. This signal can be a signal name in the format SIG<NAME>
, for instance SIGKILL
, or an unsigned number that matches a position in the kernel’s syscall table, for instance 9
.
The default is SIGTERM
if not specified.
On Windows, this flag can be used to specify the credentialspec
option. The credentialspec
must be in the format file://spec.txt
or registry://keyname
.
The --stop-timeout
flag sets the number of seconds to wait for the container to stop after sending the pre-defined (see --stop-signal
) system call signal. If the container does not exit after the timeout elapses, it is forcibly killed with a SIGKILL
signal.
If --stop-timeout
is set to -1
, no timeout is applied, and the daemon will wait indefinitely for the container to exit.
The default is determined by the daemon, and is 10 seconds for Linux containers, and 30 seconds for Windows containers.
This option is useful in situations where you are running Docker containers on Windows. The --isolation=<value>
option sets a container’s isolation technology. On Linux, the only supported is the default
option which uses Linux namespaces. These two commands are equivalent on Linux:
$ docker run -d busybox top
$ docker run -d --isolation default busybox top
On Windows, --isolation
can take one of these values:
Value | Description |
---|---|
default |
Use the value specified by the Docker daemon’s --exec-opt or system default (see below). |
process |
Shared-kernel namespace isolation. |
hyperv |
Hyper-V hypervisor partition-based isolation. |
The default isolation on Windows server operating systems is process
, and hyperv
on Windows client operating systems, such as Windows 10. Process isolation has better performance, but requires that the image and host use the same kernel version.
On Windows server, assuming the default configuration, these commands are equivalent and result in process
isolation:
PS C:\> docker run -d microsoft/nanoserver powershell echo process
PS C:\> docker run -d --isolation default microsoft/nanoserver powershell echo process
PS C:\> docker run -d --isolation process microsoft/nanoserver powershell echo process
If you have set the --exec-opt isolation=hyperv
option on the Docker daemon
, or are running against a Windows client-based daemon, these commands are equivalent and result in hyperv
isolation:
PS C:\> docker run -d microsoft/nanoserver powershell echo hyperv
PS C:\> docker run -d --isolation default microsoft/nanoserver powershell echo hyperv
PS C:\> docker run -d --isolation hyperv microsoft/nanoserver powershell echo hyperv
These parameters always set an upper limit on the memory available to the container. On Linux, this is set on the cgroup and applications in a container can query it at /sys/fs/cgroup/memory/memory.limit_in_bytes
.
On Windows, this will affect containers differently depending on what type of isolation is used.
With process
isolation, Windows will report the full memory of the host system, not the limit to applications running inside the container
PS C:\> docker run -it -m 2GB --isolation=process microsoft/nanoserver powershell Get-ComputerInfo *memory*
CsTotalPhysicalMemory : 17064509440
CsPhyicallyInstalledMemory : 16777216
OsTotalVisibleMemorySize : 16664560
OsFreePhysicalMemory : 14646720
OsTotalVirtualMemorySize : 19154928
OsFreeVirtualMemory : 17197440
OsInUseVirtualMemory : 1957488
OsMaxProcessMemorySize : 137438953344
With hyperv
isolation, Windows will create a utility VM that is big enough to hold the memory limit, plus the minimal OS needed to host the container. That size is reported as “Total Physical Memory.”
PS C:\> docker run -it -m 2GB --isolation=hyperv microsoft/nanoserver powershell Get-ComputerInfo *memory*
CsTotalPhysicalMemory : 2683355136
CsPhyicallyInstalledMemory :
OsTotalVisibleMemorySize : 2620464
OsFreePhysicalMemory : 2306552
OsTotalVirtualMemorySize : 2620464
OsFreeVirtualMemory : 2356692
OsInUseVirtualMemory : 263772
OsMaxProcessMemorySize : 137438953344
The --sysctl
sets namespaced kernel parameters (sysctls) in the container. For example, to turn on IP forwarding in the containers network namespace, run this command:
$ docker run --sysctl net.ipv4.ip_forward=1 someimage
Note
Not all sysctls are namespaced. Docker does not support changing sysctls inside of a container that also modify the host system. As the kernel evolves we expect to see more sysctls become namespaced.
IPC Namespace:
kernel.msgmax
, kernel.msgmnb
, kernel.msgmni
, kernel.sem
, kernel.shmall
, kernel.shmmax
, kernel.shmmni
, kernel.shm_rmid_forced
.fs.mqueue.*
--ipc=host
option these sysctls are not allowed.Network Namespace:
net.*
--network=host
option using these sysctls are not allowed.