Podman Desktop: A Free OSS Alternative to Docker Desktop

Recently I started using colima[0], a drop in replacement for Docker Desktop on Mac, and have seen an increase in performance and battery life. You can use all the normal docker and docker compose commands. It does not have a GUI but you can use the Docker extension on VS Code to have an overview of running containers.<p>[0]<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;abiosoft&#x2F;colima" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;abiosoft&#x2F;colima</a>

There&#x27;s also Rancher Desktop in the same space, which includes k3s as a local K8s solution.<p>For personal use I found it great and lighter than Docker Desktop. At work, unfortunately all options but Docker Desktop have issues with either 1) Our Cisco AnyConnect VPN, or 2) Our authenticated http proxy. Couldn&#x27;t find anything else providing a container runtime + a local k8s on MacOS that works in this environment. So we just got Docker Desktop licenses.

Docker Desktop for Mac released an experimental file sharing implementation back in March[0]. It made working with Docker bearable.<p>Does anyone know how well Podman performs on Mac? Especially file sharing.<p>Edit: A quick Google led me back to this HackerNews comment[1]. Looks like Docker for Mac is faster.<p>[0] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.docker.com&#x2F;blog&#x2F;speed-boost-achievement-unlocked-on-docker-desktop-4-6-for-mac" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.docker.com&#x2F;blog&#x2F;speed-boost-achievement-unlocked...</a><p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=32307595" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=32307595</a>

I have been experimenting with the arm64 windows dev kit, neither docker desktop, podman desktop or rancher desktop had arm64 builds. Installing the amd64 builds did not work either.<p>I was surprised to find out wsl2 now supports systemd<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;devblogs.microsoft.com&#x2F;commandline&#x2F;systemd-support-is-now-available-in-wsl&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;devblogs.microsoft.com&#x2F;commandline&#x2F;systemd-support-i...</a><p>I was able to install docker normally inside wsl2 and it worked perfectly. No &quot;desktop&quot; app needed. This will be a game changer when it hits GA

The problem with podman at the moment (IMO) is version drift. RHEL&#x2F;Fedora and friends get the latest and greatest (4), Debian&#x2F;Ubuntu are stuck on 3.x. This isn&#x27;t a problem with Docker, which has tight control over what is deployed. This means how you use Podman directly or indirectly via tools and plugins may change.

I really tried to use Podman, but I kept running into issues trying to get a rootless deployment on RHEL that used a protected port (53) and it gave me so much trouble that I uninstalled Podman and installed Docker.<p>Maybe I can try again, but it was frustrating enough to turn me away for a while.

Note: This is quite a big heavy Electron app, if you don&#x27;t need truly a GUI I&#x27;d recommend Colima. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;abiosoft&#x2F;colima" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;abiosoft&#x2F;colima</a>

Am I just a dum dum for not getting this to drop-in replace Docker Desktop for my relatively simple projects? Has anyone else experienced the problematic practicalities of switching, or should I just spend a bit more time with it?

For GNOME users: I recommend trying this frontend <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;marhkb&#x2F;pods" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;marhkb&#x2F;pods</a>

Hyped by those comments, I went and tried both colima and podman.<p>My use case is the simplest of them all:<p>A docker compose file for postgres12 with a folder attached as permanent volume.<p>- colima couldnt do chmod, and it failed when i tried to restore database to folder. I tracked an issue on github, known stuff, issue is couple of years old.<p>- podman made it work somehow, data restore was under way - it run out of file descriptors, again - know bug with postgres and other scenarios, tracked on github for few years.<p>turned off, fired docker again, it works.<p>meh :(

I&#x27;d just love to know if Docker is ever going to fix the issue where my computer kernel panics when going into hibernation if my macbook is unplugged and docker is running. Had an open, reproducible issue for a quite while that has affected lots of other folks too, but no real recognition from Docker.

Talking about containers: is there an easy way to run “system” containers? This is, containers that run systemd and everything else you would expect to be running on a normal Linux OS. I rely heavily on VMs to simulate cloud environments, but I would love to use lightweight containers instead. Also, these “system” containers should be able to run containers inside them as well (docker in docker?).<p>I saw something on github the other day that may work (can’t remember the name, something about “box”), but it wasn’t available for Macos.

Can this be installed side-by-side with Docker Desktop (on Windows)?

Convenient timing! I installed podman last night and was playing with it. So far it feels just like Docker. Too bad it&#x27;ll take much more time before I get to seriously recommend this at work... But that doesn&#x27;t mean I can&#x27;t use it for my personal projects :)

Nice to see some alternatives for docker for mac. If you want to keep it simple, simply running a vm (on your device or remotely) and let the docker client talk to it via ssh. I used qemu for this a while ago as it seems is podman.<p>All you need to do for this is set the DOCKER_HOST variable. It gets slightly tricky with e.g. volume mounts of course. But otherwise this works fine. Including with docker-compose. The only other thing you need to do is some port forwarding from the vm; which you can do with ssh as well.<p>Podman, Colina, and other tools are essentially just nicer versions of this with a bit more features.

I’m using (as individual, so for free) Docker Desktop on my M1 Apple silicon. It works great. Could someone tell me the benefits of switching to Podman? I like that Podman is open source, though.<p>Edit: I’m using it for free.

It&#x27;s nice to know that there is an alternative to Docker.

Seems cool and I like seeing more alternatives to Docker Desktop. However, another electron app makes sad a little.

I don’t see Multipass mentioned here. We switched from Docker desktop when the license changed and it’s been relatively smooth. The installer is friendly, there’s a vm with docker preinstalled and all we had to do was configure network bridging.

Nice, it&#x27;s on Flatpak as well.

Echoing others, is there a benefit running this over Docker? I recently setup portainer and Docker on my homelab and had everything running in about 30 min. Is there a benefit to migrate to podman?

Using podman since March of 2022. The experience has been nice, and the ability to run containers under user without going root is definitely nice. Good to see it getting some recognition.

Can I use this to manage sudo containers? It&#x27;s slightly amusing to see the desktop creates a podman daemon, so maybe you could create a sudo podman daemon for use with the desktop somehow?

Sort of off-topic. I noticed they publish Universal, intel and arm builds for MacOS. I’m struggling to understand why would they build all three? Why not do either universal or split arch?

Help me understand, is this a replacement for docker desktop? Docker desktop provides kubernetes in a neat way. Does podman provide k8s on WSL?

I wonder what virtualization they are using on mac.

The Flatpak doesn&#x27;t work for me. &quot;No Container Engine&quot; message. I thought Flatpaks were supposed to just work.

podman&#x2F;skopeo&#x2F;buildah and systemd managed user services are an absolute game changer for dockerless rootless containers. pod and service defs are supported and can be exported to k8s when or if you ever need it and theres even a podman-compose plugin to get you moved off docker compose while yoou learn

Yet another 300 MB of utter Electron crap with as little functionality as viable.

docker is free..?

Another Electron app, no thanks.<p>One day all of them will join XUL and MSHTML on a retirement home.

Pity it&#x27;s only available as a tarball or .flatpak. I&#x27;ve never got flatpak to work before, and it doesn&#x27;t work this time either. :-(