[magicpointer]

There's also Rancher Desktop in the same space, which includes k3s as a local K8s solution.

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'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.

[blibble]

> For personal use I found it great and lighter than Docker Desktop.

I don't know what Docker Desktop is doing but on a top end i9 with 128gb of ram it still takes 60 seconds to start

and the UI takes forever to do anything

it makes Teams look responsive

[mfer]

I user Rancher Desktop on an i9 with 32gb of RAM. Starts in less than a minute. I also have Teams and slack. Sometimes I have over 200 browser tabs open (yes, I have a problem). The UI is responsive pretty quickly.

A lot of delays has to do with starting VMs. You need this for Linux on Mac/Windows.

Disclaimer: I started Rancher Desktop. I might be biased.

[alex3305]

Last week I switched from Rancher Desktop back to Docker Desktop because I couldn't get VSCode Dev Containers to work properly. I was stumped because it should work out of the box. However it didn't work on a fresh install of Docker Desktop either. Apparently when Rancher Desktop was first released I've installed it and setup a Docker alias in my ~/.zshrc:

   alias docker=nerdctl

After removing that alias everything worked first try with Docker Desktop. However after starting up a couple of Dev containers and some debugger my machine crawled to a halt and was memory swapping like there was no tomorrow. I found that this behavior could be normal for Docker Desktop. So I think I'm going to switch back to Rancher Desktop (or perhaps Podman Desktop) sooner than later.

[parski]

Hi,

Sorry for using this comment as a way to get ahold of you but there is no DM function on HN and the comment I was wondering about was posted by you 18 days ago and the comments are locked now.

Here is the comment in question: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33347058

I have been controlling my water heater with HA for a few months and I too am risk averse when it comes to legionella. You have taken it to another level by replacing the sensor inside with a DS18B20. I was also interested in doing this but I don't really want to drill into it. How did you install the sensor? Is the water not under pressure? I've just measured water temperature at the tap with a meat thermometer and under flow into a container to determine that the temperature falls in the range that is safe for legionella growth. Would love to look into a proper sensor again if you have any information about that.

Again, sorry for hijacking your completely unrelated comment.

[alex3305]

No worries. I am glad to answer your questions.

First of all, I'm also concerned by legionella growth. However all the sources I can find suggests that at a legionella run above 60 degrees celsius once a week should be enough to kill all bacteria. So that's what I'm doing.

My sensor installation was extremely easy. My warm water heater is in fact a barrel within a barrel. And some insulation material between those barrels. If it would only be metal, you lose too much heat. In the outside barrel (excuse me for lack of a better term) there was an analogue thermometer. This thermometer has a metal back so it makes direct contact with the inside barrel. I just pulled this one out and replaced it with a DS18B20 probe. Again metal against metal, so maximum contact.

Finally I have calibrated the sensor by running it with hot water at the tap and measuring the temperature both there and on the warm water heater (with 2 DS18B20). I've done this for several temperatures with intervals of 10 degrees. I've ignored possible sensor deviations. Finally I used Excel's INTERCEPT and SLOPE functions on the range to calculate the value needed for a linear equation. I have used the formula:

    boiler_temperature * SLOPE + INTERCEPT

My math is probably far from perfect and I might revisit it one day. But it works for me currently. I also visualized the measurement results with my calculations and they seem to be pretty accurate. Especially when accounting for missing measurements.

I've also added my personal page to the 'About me' on here, and I have the same Reddit username if you want to DM me there.

[blibble]

raw "wsl --shutdown" followed by "wsl" takes maybe a second tops

[andrewaylett]

It seems like some folks' idea of "far too many" tabs is significantly lower than my idea of a "normal" number.

Currently at 220 in one window, 350 in another, and eight in a third.

[dmix]

> Sometimes I have over 200 browser tabs open

This is where those extensions (or native Firefox) is good for auto-sleeping tabs you haven't looked at in the last 10-20min. Saves so much CPU.

[anderspitman]

Starting a WHPX-accelerated VM with QEMU on Windows takes less than 15 seconds with a minimal init. Is Hyper-V really that much slower?

[jve]

Don't think so. Starting WSL2 VM takes few seconds.

[fuckstick]

> I user Rancher Desktop on an i9 with 32gb of RAM. Starts in less than a minute.

This is considered good?

[jbverschoor]

Reminds me of people working on Java apps, who had to wait 2-3 minutes for every freaking change

[PaulWaldman]

Are you on Windows? I believe it is using Hyper-V and running containers in a VM. The loading time is probably how long it takes to start the VM.

[giobox]

"Docker Desktop" uses a VM for container execution on all supported OSes - Windows, macOS and Linux - default installs are not running "docker" natively at your local CLI if you are using "Docker Desktop" to run docker, even on Linux.

> https://www.docker.com/blog/the-magic-behind-the-scenes-of-d...

> https://docs.docker.com/desktop/install/linux-install/

> https://docs.docker.com/desktop/faqs/linuxfaqs/#what-is-the-...

"Docker Desktop on Linux runs a Virtual Machine (VM) so creates and uses a custom docker context desktop-linux on startup." I had previously assumed it would be native on Linux, but apparently not. To be clear, this only applies when talking about "Docker Desktop" installations - not the same thing as "docker" etc etc.

I also think the performance is pretty bad, and I've used it on all three OSes at one time or another. I simply never install "Docker Desktop" on Linux typically anyway - it adds so little value over a basic native local docker install there.

The only thing I think "Docker Desktop" is really great at is creating FUD regarding using the alternatives or even plain ole free "docker", but that is probably its primary means of generating revenue for the company - I've seen docker desktop licences get deployed everywhere recently, regardless of the merits. So many users I encounter don't even understand the distinction now between docker/docker-desktop, or that there is one.

[mfer]

Running in a VM is there for very good reasons. If you look at where things are going to be installed on the base system, how you can reset the environment, how you deal with variations with other things installed on the host, and more. It's difficult to do this all well outside of a VM.

Also, there are many people who want that VM boundary. We found this when designing for Linux in Rancher Desktop and talking with people about it.

[anderspitman]

Interesting. What are they using to run the VM on Linux? QEMU? I looked through the article but didn't see that part explained.

[tyingq]

On windows, docker desktop can use Hyper-V, but it also supports WSL2 as a backend.

[lsaferite]

The DD WSL2 backend is also creating a VM in Hyper-V. Actually, it's creating two VMs (docker-desktop and docker-desktop-data). It's also running a proxy in your WSL2 VM so you can access the docker server. It's all a bit convoluted TBH.

I actually decided today to stop using DD on my Windows machine and just run docker native inside the WSL2 VM instance instead. Still not sure what solution I'm going for on my Mac.

[alisonatwork]

This is the way. It's even easier if you just winget install RedHat.Podman - that'll give you a tiny Fedora image where "docker" (podman) just works straight out of the box. No need to worry about getting iptables-legacy packages for your WSL distribution or whatever. It's so simple and lightweight, it feels like a much better solution than anything Docker ever did for Windows.

[hdougie]

I do the same for the most part. I have the docker daemon setup both locally in Windows and also in WSL2. I then have multiple contexts setup in Windows so that I can easily switch between Windows/Linux containers from my host terminal. Thus far, I've not experienced any issues.

The initial setup was a little more complex than just running Docker Desktop, but since then, it's running flawlessly.

[mook]

Talking about WSL2 in general: it creates one VM, with mount namespaces per "distro". That's why everything shares the same network (they didn't set up separate network namespaces). Also, the GUI support in Windows 11 is a separate mount namespace.

[tyingq]

Well, yes, but it creates those when you log in. The proxy fixes some corp firewall issues (see other comments here). Start up is faster overall for me versus the normal backend.

[giobox]

> also supports WSL2 as a backend.

Also known as a VM, but maybe you get better warm up times. My main complaints are with the "docker desktop" app experience - not so much "docker" itself VM or otherwise. It adds so little to docker for the license cost too, at least so far.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wsl/compare-versio...

You can simply install docker in a VM/WSL2 natively yourself and avoid docker desktop/licensing altogether. "Docker Desktop" is/was really a tool to simplify getting a Linux Kernel (the critical dependency for cross-platform container dev) on non-Linux platforms IMO, which seems wild to pay for to me in its current state and when Windows has a great built in VM via WSL2 anyway. That it even exists on Linux now (recent addition) is kinda amusing - on MacOS and Windows there is at least some argument to be made it simplifies getting the kernel...

[bakugo]

The WSL2 backend is pretty broken from my experience, it will often lock up using 100% CPU after I put my laptop into sleep/hibernation, and the only reliable way to bring it back seems to be killing the VM in task manager and restarting. Dunno if this is Windows' fault or Docker's though.

[pablomalo]

Same here. I do not have admin rights on the machine so, unless I'm mistaken, I don't have any other option but to reboot.

[dboreham]

Not broken for me fwiw on four different machines, one is ARM.

[FireBeyond]

Yup. I have a Mac Pro 2019, 12 core Xeon, 192GB, and the Desktop app and VM location reside on a RAID0 M.2 array that can throughput 6GB/s. Still a minute+.

[gbraad]

You can use wsl-gvproxy(*), which uses our CRC usermode network stack to allow use with VPN. We are working on making this an option for podman machine. Alternatively, or to test, you can use CRC from our crc-org project and run the podman preset. This uses a dedicated VM using native hypervisors and the gvproxy setup.

I am the teamlead of CRC and work on the Windows enablement of podman machine, with the podman desktop team. Gladly take questions here or by email.

(*) also known as wsl-vpnkit

[magicpointer]

Unfortunately I'm on MacOS and not Windows. But I'll pass this info to my Windows-using colleagues, thanks!

[alphalima]

I had similar issues with a different VPN/Proxy at an earlier role. I solved with https://github.com/sakai135/wsl-vpnkit and trusting the root certificate of the proxy on the rancher desktop WSL2 vm (Assuming you're on Windows as I was).

Docker desktop pays for itself by solving these issues though IMO (I wasn't able to get a licence at the old role however)

[MrBuddyCasino]

I suppose Docker Compose won‘t work with those alternatives?

[jchw]

Podman works with Docker Compose enough to run stuff I've had to deal with at work and home. I prefer to use the podman-compose script usually, since it does offer some small advantages when using Podman. That said, even with the podman-compose script, I ran into an issue where some syntax somewhere needed to be adjusted for Podman; I can't remember exactly what and I don't have access to the repository to check, but it was a security-related flag, and it was fixed in master at some point, I believe.

Getting Podman to run CUDA/Nvidia workloads was a bit more challenging, but that can also be done.

[depereo]

Compose works (with caveats, sometimes significant ones) with podman.

Rancher desktop works seamlessly with docker-compose. No issues at all.

[Macha]

Docker Compose works fine with Rancher Desktop. You can use it with Podman on Linux too, you just need to enable the socket since normally Podman does without - I'd imagine there's some way to enable this on Podman desktop too.

[mfer]

For Rancher Desktop, Docker Compose works with Rancher Desktop when you choose dockerd (moby). If you choose to use straight containerd (with nerdctl as a CLI) than compose isn't going to work.

[matamagu]

If you choose to use straight containerd then you can use nerdctl compose too.

[sgarland]

I ran into this issue[0] when trying to use docker-compose locally, connecting to a Podman VM.

[0]: https://github.com/docker/compose/issues/9448