What is a container?

Table of contents

A container is an isolated environment for your code. This means that a container has no knowledge of your operating system, or your files. It runs on the environment provided to you by Docker Desktop. Containers have everything that your code needs in order to run, down to a base operating system. You can use Docker Desktop to manage and explore your containers.

In this walkthrough, you'll view and explore an actual container in Docker Desktop.

Before you start, get the latest version of Docker Desktop. Docker adds new features regularly and some parts of this guide may work only with the latest version of Docker Desktop.

Step 1: Set up the walkthrough

The first thing you need is a running container. Use the following instructions to run a container.

Open Docker Desktop and select the search.
Specify docker/welcome-to-docker in the search and then select Run.
Expand the Optional settings.
In Container name, specify welcome-to-docker.
In Host port, specify 8088.
Select Run.

Step 2: View containers on Docker Desktop

You just ran a container! You can view it in the Containers tab of Docker Desktop. This container runs a simple web server that displays a simple website. When working with more complex projects, you'll run different parts in different containers. For example, a different container for the frontend, backend, and database. In this walkthrough, you only have a simple frontend container.