Utilizing dev containers
When you’re utilizing dev containers as a part of your normal toolchain, you’ll be able to create a library of options that may be rapidly added to your container definitions. You may customise off-the-shelf containers or rapidly construct a brand new definition for a brand new undertaking, treating options as constructing blocks that sit on prime of an ordinary base container that’s been outlined for a particular stack.
The fundamental means of constructing a dev container makes lots of sense. It’s a top-down strategy, which wants to begin with architects and dev leads agreeing on a undertaking stack. You may then discover a base platform picture, say .Web, within the VS Code container gallery. Upon getting that, you customise it in your undertaking, including new instruments by modifying the devcontainer.json in VS Code and by including predefined options. As soon as the container is able to use, deploy it and the mandatory VS Code instruments to your improvement crew.
Your native container host must be working Docker or a minimum of have a Docker-compliant CLI on prime of its engine. The CLI is vital right here, because the dev container works via it somewhat than needing direct entry to your container host. That’s each a profit and a downside: There’s no dependency on APIs and even on Docker itself. So long as a container surroundings helps the Docker CLI, you should utilize it along with your dev containers. Nevertheless, if it doesn’t, you’ll be able to’t. Meaning there are points with various container engines, equivalent to Podman, which solely help a subset of the Docker CLI. After all, as dev containers is an open supply undertaking, there’s ongoing work to help different container engines, and you can also make requests or submit code through GitHub.
