Containers & Docker: Emerging Roles & Future of
Cloud Technology
Sachchidanand Singh
IBM Software Lab
Pune, India - 411 057
Email: sach.success@gmail.com
Abstract— Container-based virtualization uses single kernel
to run multiple instances on an operating system and
virtualization layer runs as an application within the operating
system. It is also called operating system virtualization and in
this approach, the kernel of operating system runs on the
hardware node with different isolated guest virtual machines
(VMs) called containers.
The container-based virtualization doesn't require each
guest to run a completely installed operating system. This
virtualization approach also helps to improve performance
since there is a single operating system taking care of all
hardware calls. The disadvantage of container-based
virtualization is that each guest must use the same operating
system the host uses.
In hypervisor-based virtualization the virtual machine is
not a complete operating system instance but its partial
instance of the operating system and hypervisor allows
multiple operating systems to share a single hardware host.
However in container-based virtualization, a kernel is run
with several different virtual machines installed on top of it.
The container-based virtualization is used in Linux
environments like Parallels Virtuozzo and open source
OpenVZ project.
This paper highlights the role of Container based
virtualization and Docker in shaping the future of Cloud
technology. The adoption of containers will continue to grow
and majority of Microservice applications will be built on the
containers in the future.
Keywords—Containers, Cloud, Docker, Hypervisor,
Virtualization, Windows Server Containers, Hyper-V
Containers, Bluemix, CoreOS, Kubernetes, Cloud Foundry,
Carina.
I. INTRODUCTION
Hypervisor based virtualization uses a thin kernel called
base layer which route instructions coming from virtual
machines to the underlying hardware layer. The Windows
Hyper-V uses a Microsoft kernel and Linux kernel is used by
VMware ESX Server.
The virtual machines (VMs) are created on top of the
hypervisor in the hypervisor based virtualization. Here virtual
machines (VMs) are completely installed Operating
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c IEEE
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Nirmala Singh
Tech Mahindra
Pune, India - 411 057
Email: nirmala.online@gmail.com
System(OS). The biggest challenge in this model is to access
hardware without virtualizing all drivers for the hardware
beforehand but we can still uses paravirtualization as a
workaround. In full virtualization scenario, all hardware
should be virtualized before it can be assigned to a VM which
will run a complete copy of the operating system.
The Container-based virtualization uses a different
approach, here standard host operating system is at the base
and can be a Windows or Linux host when using Parallels
Virtuozzo virtualization. The virtualization layer is on top of
it and runs as an application within the operating system.
The virtualization layer offers a file system and kernel
service abstraction layer which isolates resources among all
virtual machines called "Containers" and it ensures that each
container appears as a standalone server.[3]
II. OS-LEVEL VIRTUALIZATION AND HYPERVISOR-BASED
VIRTUALIZATION
The container-based virtualization does not use complete
virtual machines and hence no overhead of running a
completely installed operating system. The advantage of this
approach is that there is no need to duplicate functionality like
hardware calls since there is just one operating system to take
care of all hardware access.[1][10]
The performance problems related to hardware access by
means of driver virtualization can be avoided using Container-
based virtualization. But one limitation using containers is that
there is no flexibility to virtualize different operating systems.
The container-based virtualization is also called OS level
virtualization.
In hypervisor-based virtualization every virtual machine
(VM) needs a complete operating-system installation
including a kernel which makes it massive but very flexible.
Every virtual machine has its own kernel and hypervisor
coordinates access to hardware. Therefore we can install any
operating system and these Operating Systems run in
completely isolated environments.[2]
In container-based virtualization all virtual machines uses
the same kernel and doesn't need a hypervisor. The container-
based virtualization are used in Windows and Linux. The
container based virtualization is suitable choice if optimal
efficiency is priority and operating systems preference is less
important.[5]
The hosting provider tries to use the same operating
system for every virtual machine in order to simplify VM
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 maintenance since it's easy to update hundreds of virtual
machines on a physical server with one Linux kernel patch.
III. BENEFITS OF CONTAINER-BASED VIRTUALIZATION
Container-based virtualization improves performance
and efficiency compared to conventional hypervisor since
additional resources needed for each OS is eliminated. In
scenario when single operating system is required, the
container-based virtualization is best fit.
The Container-based virtualization uses a single kernel to
run multiple instances of an operating system and it does not
duplicate functionality. Each container instance runs in a
completely isolated secure environment.
Container-based virtualization is more resource efficient
since all applications runs on top of the same kernel and
instances are smaller and faster to create or migrate. It means a
single system can potentially host more containers than VMs
but it limits the flexibility and choice of your operating
systems. And single OS creates situation of single point of
failure for all of the containers. For ex- a virus attack or crash
of host OS can impact all of the containers.
Containers are regarded as more resource efficient
compared to VMs because the additional resources needed for
each OS is eliminated and instances are smaller and faster to
create or migrate. Cloud service providers are more interested
in containers because far more container instances can be
deployed on same hardware investment.
IV. BENEFITS OF DOCKER CONTAINERS
Docker is a container technology which makes it easy
to package and distribute software along with its other
dependencies. It makes shipping of software code easy to
staging or production or any other environment. Docker is
written in Go, an open source programming language created
in 2007 at Google by Robert Griesemer, Rob Pike, and Ken
Thompson. Developer community is working aggressively on
Docker API which have 15 revisions made so far in the past
1.5 years.
IBM is founding member of Open Container Platform
(OCP) formed by partners and users to create industry
standards around container formats and runtime. IBM
Containers are built on Bluemix which is a Platform-as-a-
Service(PaaS) which provides efficient environment to enable
faster integration and access to big data, analytics and security
services.
A. Application Portability
Docker puts all application dependencies in container which
is portable on different platforms. The distributed applications
can be built, move and run using containers. The application
developers and administrators can run same application on
laptops, VMs or cloud by automating deployment inside
containers.[14],[20]
B. Docker is lightweight and fast
Containers are lightweight and fast compared to Virtual
Machine(VM) since VMs boot an entire operating system to
start and consume resource as each VM has to run a full OS
instance. However starting a container is just like starting a
process.[7],[16]
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C. Optimal resource utilization
Docker allows to allocate and limit CPU, memory,
network and disk resources to all the process using Linux's
Control Groups. It ensures that one process is not taking over
all of the computer resources and starving the other
processes.[20]
D. Docker is growing
Docker depends on Linux Containers (LXC), cgroups and
namespaces capabilities which don't exist in Windows.
Microsoft have its own container technology on Windows but
they are working on hooks to enable Docker containers to run
on Windows Server.[6],[13],[15],[17]
E. Best fit for Microservices architecture
The Microservice architecture is supported by containers as
each microservice can be deployed without interfering with
other micro services. Containers provide suitable environment
for service deployment in terms of speed, isolation and ease of
deployment of new versions.[20]
F. Resource Utilization
The containers are lightweight, portable, efficient and
can run on physical servers. We can run more containers on a
physical servers than virtual machines which results in higher
resource utilization. Containers consists of application code
along with its dependencies and runs as an isolated process
sharing the kernel with other containers in the user space on
the host operating system.[20]
V. DOCKER CONTAINER ARCHITECTURE
The Docker architecture currently leverage Linux
Containers(LXC) which have features like cgroups and
namespaces for resource control and strong process isolation
etc. In addition Docker architecture could leverage Kernel-
based Virtual Machine(KVM) to do the same things.[6]
Linux Containers(LXC) is OS level virtualization to run
multiple isolated Linux systems on a single Linux control host
and it works as userspace interface for the Linux kernel
containment features. Linux Containers(LXC) are based on
chroot which contains binaries, libraries and configuration file
therefore called chroot jail and this approach allows for an
isolated environment on top of the kernel.[12]
Cgroups are groups of resources which can be created at
the Linux kernel level and can be assigned priorities therefore
it can be ensured that each virtual machine have exactly only
those resources which are actually required. It makes container
based virtualization an efficient environment.
Container platforms from Cloud Foundry, Kubernetes and
CoreOS offer feasible virtualization alternatives but Docker
containers have gained a lot of momentum and achieved hype
status. Companies like VMware, IBM and Microsoft are
working on to develop their container strategy on cloud.[4]
Docker provides feasible and cheaper alternative to
hypervisor based virtual machines. It have two major
components- the open source containerization platform called
Docker and Docker Hub which is a Software-as-a-
Service(SaaS) platform to share and manage Docker
805
 containers. Docker uses a client server architecture model. The
Docker client can talk to the Docker daemon which creates,
run and distribute Docker containers.
The Docker client and daemon can run on the same system
or a Docker client can ccommunicate through sockets or
RESTful API to a remote Docker daemon.[21]
Fig. 1. Docker Architecture[21]
Docker daemon runs on a host machine and users interact
with daemon through Docker client. Docker client is primary
user interface and its in the form of Docker binary. The role of
Docker client is to accept commands from users and
communicate bidirectional communication with Docker
daemon.
Docker images are read-only templates and Docker
registries hold these images. And Docker containers are
created from Docker image and it holds things needed to run
an application. We can perform activities of run, start, stop,
move or delete on Docker containers and each container is an
isolated and secure application platform.[21]
VI. MONOLITHIC VERSUS MICROSERVICES ARCHITECTURE
In Monolithic architecture application is deployed as a
single file or collection of files rooted at the same directory
and all the application code runs in the same process. Here we
need to deploy multiple copies of the same application code to
multiple servers in order to achieve scaling.
The services defined in Monolithic architecture are
decomposed into individual services in the Microservices
architecture and are deployed individually on separate hosts.
In Monolithic architecture gradually new features and services
are added to the application and over time the code base
becomes huge and complex. The Microservices architecture is
designed to address this type of challenges. Each Microservice
is meant for a specific business function and it defines the
operations necessary for that business function. A
microservices architecture approach makes web based
development agile in the nature and easier to maintain the
code base. Docker is an enabler for a Microservices
architecture and container based application deployment.
VII. HOW CONTAINER TECHNOLOGY FITS IN THE CLOUD
AND CHALLENGES
Docker is a container management system which
automates the process of creating containers to run
applications or components. Containers are managed by a set
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of APIs which can be built from templates or commands. It's
possible to create container based systems on any OS which
supports container like partitioning however Docker uses
Linux container tools. Hence Linux specific applications and
components are run by Docker containers. Although Docker
can run in a VM hosted by a different OS but it requires a
Linux guest OS within the VM to serve the containers.
Although Docker containers can run on a non-Linux host
OS but they are still limited to Linux applications and use of
Docker outside Linux hosts is complex. The Docker
containers hosted on Windows' servers can be valuable to
users having large Windows server requirements and wants to
add Linux-based applications.
Enterprises can host containers on public cloud VMs in the
data centers and available Docker tools can help to deploy
container-based components, support workflows and can
facilitate hybrid cloud use with easy failover support. The VM
based virtualization have the advantages of isolation which is
useful for public clouds.
VIII. CONTAINER TECHNOLOGY AND ROAD AHEAD
The growing user interest and widespread adoption of
Docker and container technology have forced legacy vendors
to deliver their at least first container products but it needs to
be seen in long run how these technologies can smoothly
integrate and meet the technical requirements of legacy
systems.[19]
VMware unveiled two open source offerings in 2015
named -'Project Lightwave' and 'Project Photon'. The Project
Lightwave focuses on identity and access management and
Project Photon to manage containers and VMs on a single
platform.[8]
Bluemix is a cloud Platform as a Service (PaaS) offering
developed by IBM. Bluemix is a hybrid cloud development
platform based on Cloud Foundry open technology and runs
on SoftLayer.
Microsoft has promised to introduce Windows Server
Containers and Hyper-V Containers in upcoming Windows
Server 2016. The Azure Container Service release by
Microsoft helps larger IT shops to deploy and set up Apache
Mesos to cluster & schedule Docker applications across
multiple virtual hosts.
There are several alternatives to VMware container
platform like Docker, Kubernetes, CoreOS and Cloud
Foundry. The Project Photon of VMware will be shipped with
the Pivotal Cloud Foundry. The Open Container Project
(OCP) will go a long way toward driving the IT industry to
top one or two container deployment methodologies which
will functionally merge rest of all competing approaches.[11]
Already OCP is signed by VMware, Amazon Web Services,
HP, IBM, Microsoft, Google, EMC and Red Hat etc.[9]
The Google's Kubernetes open source project, CoreOS's
open source Rocket project and Docker Platform will
contribute to future container administration and
management.[18]
Containers provide a mechanism to improve efficiency
through sharing of operating system binaries. This approach
helps to improve host capacity and makes patch management
easier since there are fewer operating systems to patch. A
 container keeps the application binaries and configuration files
and stores the OS components which application modifies.
Rackspace rolled out Carina in beta for free on the
Rackspace Public Cloud in 2015. Carina is a container service
used to simplify and speed deployments on cloud. It allows
users to provision Docker Swarm clusters with native Docker
APIs and create and deploy containerized applications. Intel is
supporting container as a service with its Cloud Integrity
Technology 3.0. The leading cloud providers like Amazon,
Microsoft, IBM and Google are adopting container and
supporting container as a service technology.
Containers as a service (CaaS) is a form of container-based
virtualization in which container engines, orchestration &
underlying compute resources are provided to users as a
service. Most of the public cloud providers like Amazon Web
Services (AWS), IBM, Google, Rackspace and Joyent have
some type of CaaS offering.
The adoption of containers is expected to grow and
majority of Microservice applications will be built on the
containers in the future. And existing cloud platforms will
either switch to a new container stack or at least start
supporting containers.
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2nd International Conference on Applied and Theoretical Computing and Communication Technology (iCATccT)
Authorized licensed use limited to: Vilnius Gediminas Technical University. Downloaded on October 31,2022 at 13:53:02 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
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