Objective
Essentially what I am trying to accomplish is to install a bunch of software but store the commands run in the Dockerfile in the end. I was planning on recording the installation process by running the "script" function to record the commands run on the command line. I would like to know why it doesn't work but if there is a better way of doing it, I am all ears!
The issue
I'm sure there is a simple answer to this but I can't seem to figure it out. When I create a dummy file within my docker container it dissapears when I exit the container even though the container is running in the background.
Attempt
This is my Dockerfile
##Filename = Dockerfile
FROM centos:7
WORKDIR /dummy_folder
CMD ["echo", "hello world"]
I build the image and run it in the background.
docker build -t my_test_image:v1.0 .
docker run -d e9e949b5d85a tail -f /dev/null
Now I can see my container running in the background
docker ps
CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES
6f4da7a1b74d e9e949b5d85a "tail -f /dev/null" 14 minutes ago Up 14 minutes trusting_poincare
If I create an interactive session and just dump a file in /dummy_folder and exit. When I create a new interactive session /dummy_folder is empty again.
docker run -it e9e949b5d85a /bin/bash
echo "dummy" > dummy
exit
docker run -it e9e949b5d85a /bin/bash
ls -alh /dummy_folder
P.S tail -f /dev/null is just a trick I use to keep the container running in the background as just running it with the flag -d doesn't work for centos containers apparently.
I am running Docker version 19.03.8, build afacb8b
Thanks
Sabri
You're creating a new container every time your run docker run ... . What I think you're trying to do is run a shell on the same container you started with docker run -d e9e949b5d85a tail -f /dev/null. If so, the Docker command your'e looking for is exec
Start an interactive session using the container ID (not the image ID) and do your stuff
docker exec -it 6f4da7a1b74d /bin/bash
$ echo "dummy" > dummy
$ exit
And then check the contents again with exec
docker exec 6f4da7a1b74d ls -alh /dummy_folder
I am just starting out with Docker. I have this Dockerfile:
FROM jonathonf/manjaro
CMD ["pacman", "-S", "--noconfirm", "git"]
When I build the image with
sudo docker build -t uname/description:tag .
and then run it with
sudo docker run IMAGE_ID
, where IMAGE_ID is the ID I get from sudo docker images command, the command in the Dockerfile CMD ["pacman", "-S", "--noconfirm", "git"] runs, git is installed, a container is created (that I can commit).
If I run the image with
sudo docker run IMAGE_ID /bin/bash
the CMD from the Dockerfile is not executed.
I expected it to run the commands from the Dockerfile, make git available in the container and let me work further in the shell.
Couple of things here:
If you want git installed always, why run it as a CMD and then manually commit as a new image, rather than just running in a Dockerfile RUN instruction?
Anything you put after docker run... is going to run as the CMD and override it. If you don't want to override it, you should put it as an ENTRYPOINT instead. But really you should do 1.
When you use CMD ["pacman", "-S", "--noconfirm", "git"] in your dockerfile, you are setting pacman -S --noconfirm git as pid-1 process of your container.
Now when you run container sudo docker run IMAGE_ID the first process will be the one specified in the CMD. You can verify this by running docker exec -it container-id ps -ef
When you run sudo docker run IMAGE_ID /bin/bash the pid-1 process of your docker container is replaced by /bin/bash.
[user#jumphost ~]$ docker run -itd -p 3666:3306 alpine sh
dcef6d1cc121bfd195552fa7639038ac513a74eaa035a855bb7917dd620be642
[user#jumphost ~]$ docker ps
CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES
dcef6d1cc121 alpine "sh" 2 seconds ago Up 2 seconds 0.0.0.0:3666->3306/tcp fervent_euclid
[user#jumphost ~]$ docker exec -it dcef6d1cc121 ps -ef
PID USER TIME COMMAND
1 root 0:00 sh
7 root 0:00 ps -ef
[user#jumphost ~]$
Also to know more about CMD check this out.
Also check docker entrypoint and its difference with CMD.
Hope this helps.
Thats how Docker works. You override the CMD from your Dockerfile. If you want to achive both, a git Install and your bash command, move your CMD command to RUN command. Please consider Dockerfile documentation https://docs.docker.com/engine/reference/builder/#run
I'm french and new here (so I don't know how stack overflow works, his community) I'm gonna try to adapt myself.
So, my first problem is the following :
I run docker container with my image who it created with Dockerfile. (there is DNS container)
In Dockerfile, this container have to start script.sh when it start.
But after use that :
docker run -d -ti -p 53:53 alex/dns
(Use -p 53:53 because DNS.)
I can see my DNS runing at the end of my script.sh but, when I do :
Docker ps -a ; but > container is not running.
I'm novice with docker. I have started to learn it 2days ago.
I tried to add (one by one of course):
CMD ["bash"]
CMD ["/bin/bash"]
to run bash and make sure that does not poweroff.
I tried to add -d in Docker run command
I tried to use :
docker commit ti alex/dns
and
docker exec -ti alex/dns /bin/bsh
My dockerfile file :
FROM debian
...
RUN apt-get install bind9
...
ADD script.sh /usr/bin/script.sh
...
ENTRYPOINT ["/bin/bash", "script.sh]
CMD ["/bin/bash"]
My file script.sh :
service bind9 stop
*It copy en remplace conf file for bind9*
service bind9 restart
I hope that there are not too many mistakes and that I managed to make myself understood
I expect the DNS container stay runing and can use it with docker exec.
But now, after use docker run, the container start en stop juste after my script finish. Yes, the DNS server is runing the container tell me before close [ok] Bind9 running or somthing like that. But after container stop.
I suspect the problem you're facing is that your container will terminate once service bind9 restart completes.
You need to have a foreground process running to keep the container running.
I'm unfamiliar with bind9 but I recommend you explore ways to run bind9 in the foreground in your container.
Your command to run the container is correct:
docker run -d -ti -p 53:53 alex/dns
You may need to:
RUN apt-get update && apt-get -y install bind9
You will likely need something like (don't know):
ENTRYPOINT ["/bind9"]
Googled it ;-)
https://manpages.debian.org/jessie/bind9/named.8.en.html
After you've configured it, you can run it as a foreground process:
ENTRYPOINT ["named","-g"]
Dockerfile:
FROM shawnzhu/ruby-nodejs:0.12.7
RUN \
apt-get install git \
&& npm install -g bower gulp grunt \
gem install sass
RUN useradd -ms /bin/bash devel
# Deal with ssh
COPY ssh_keys/id_rsa /devel/.ssh/id_rsa
COPY ssh_keys/id_rsa.pub /devel/.ssh/id_rsa.pub
RUN echo "IdentityFile /devel/.ssh/id_rsa" > /devel/.ssh/config
# set root password
RUN echo 'root:password' | chpasswd
# Add gitconfig
COPY .gitconfig /devel/.gitconfig
USER devel
WORKDIR /var/www/
EXPOSE 80
docker-compose.yml file:
nodejs:
build: .
ports:
- "8001:80"
- "3000:3000"
volumes:
- ~/Web/docker/nodejs/www:/var/www
Commands:
$ docker-compose build nodejs
$ docker images
REPOSITORY TAG IMAGE ID CREATED VIRTUAL SIZE
nodejs_nodejs latest aece5fb27134 2 minutes ago 596.5 MB
shawnzhu/ruby-nodejs 0.12.7 bbd5b568b88f 5 months ago 547.5 MB
$ docker-compose up -d nodejs
Creating nodejs_nodejs_1
$ docker ps
CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES
$ docker ps --all
CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES
c24c6d0e756b nodejs_nodejs "/bin/bash" About a minute ago Exited (0) About a minute ago nodejs_nodejs_1
As you can see the docker-compose up -d should have created a container and run it on the background, but it didn't. Instead it exited with code 0.
If your Dockerfile doesn't do anything (for example a webserver to listen on port 80), it will be discarded as soon as it finishes running the instructions. Because Docker containers should be "ephemeral".
If you just want to start a container and interact with it via terminal, don't use docker-compose up -d, use the following instead:
docker run -it --entrypoint=/bin/bash [your_image_id]
This will start your container and run /bin/bash, the -it helps you keep the terminal session to interact with the container. When you are done doing your works, press Ctrl-D to exit.
I had a similar problem with SQL Server 2017 container exiting soon after it was created. The process running inside the container should be long running, otherwise Docker will exit the container. In the docker-compose scenario I implemented the tty:true approach which is documented here https://www.handsonarchitect.com/2018/01/docker-compose-tip-how-to-avoid-sql.html
According to tutorial I read so far, use "docker run -d" will start a container from image, and the container will run in background. This is how it looks like, we can see we already have container id.
root#docker:/home/root# docker run -d centos
605e3928cdddb844526bab691af51d0c9262e0a1fc3d41de3f59be1a58e1bd1d
But if I ran "docker ps", nothing was returned.
So I tried "docker ps -a", I can see container already exited:
root#docker:/home/root# docker ps -a
CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES
605e3928cddd centos:latest "/bin/bash" 31 minutes ago Exited (0) 31 minutes ago kickass_swartz
Anything I did wrong? How can I troubleshoot this issue?
The centos dockerfile has a default command bash.
That means, when run in background (-d), the shell exits immediately.
Update 2017
More recent versions of docker authorize to run a container both in detached mode and in foreground mode (-t, -i or -it)
In that case, you don't need any additional command and this is enough:
docker run -t -d centos
The bash will wait in the background.
That was initially reported in kalyani-chaudhari's answer and detailed in jersey bean's answer.
vonc#voncvb:~$ d ps -a
CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES
4a50fd9e9189 centos "/bin/bash" 8 seconds ago Up 2 seconds wonderful_wright
Note that for alpine, Marinos An reports in the comments:
docker run -t -d alpine/git does not keep the process up.
Had to do: docker run --entrypoint "/bin/sh" -it alpine/git
Original answer (2015)
As mentioned in this article:
Instead of running with docker run -i -t image your-command, using -d is recommended because you can run your container with just one command and you don’t need to detach terminal of container by hitting Ctrl + P + Q.
However, there is a problem with -d option. Your container immediately stops unless the commands keep running in foreground.
Docker requires your command to keep running in the foreground. Otherwise, it thinks that your applications stops and shutdown the container.
The problem is that some application does not run in the foreground. How can we make it easier?
In this situation, you can add tail -f /dev/null to your command.
By doing this, even if your main command runs in the background, your container doesn’t stop because tail is keep running in the foreground.
So this would work:
docker run -d centos tail -f /dev/null
Or in Dockerfile:
ENTRYPOINT ["tail"]
CMD ["-f","/dev/null"]
A docker ps would show the centos container still running.
From there, you can attach to it or detach from it (or docker exec some commands).
According to this answer, adding the -t flag will prevent the container from exiting when running in the background. You can then use docker exec -i -t <image> /bin/bash to get into a shell prompt.
docker run -t -d <image> <command>
It seems that the -t option isn't documented very well, though the help says that it "allocates a pseudo-TTY."
Background
A Docker container runs a process (the "command" or "entrypoint") that keeps it alive. The container will continue to run as long as the command continues to run.
In your case, the command (/bin/bash, by default, on centos:latest) is exiting immediately (as bash does when it's not connected to a terminal and has nothing to run).
Normally, when you run a container in daemon mode (with -d), the container is running some sort of daemon process (like httpd). In this case, as long as the httpd daemon is running, the container will remain alive.
What you appear to be trying to do is to keep the container alive without a daemon process running inside the container. This is somewhat strange (because the container isn't doing anything useful until you interact with it, perhaps with docker exec), but there are certain cases where it might make sense to do something like this.
(Did you mean to get to a bash prompt inside the container? That's easy! docker run -it centos:latest)
Solution
A simple way to keep a container alive in daemon mode indefinitely is to run sleep infinity as the container's command. This does not rely doing strange things like allocating a TTY in daemon mode. Although it does rely on doing strange things like using sleep as your primary command.
$ docker run -d centos:latest sleep infinity
$ docker ps
CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES
d651c7a9e0ad centos:latest "sleep infinity" 2 seconds ago Up 2 seconds nervous_visvesvaraya
Alternative Solution
As indicated by cjsimon, the -t option allocates a "pseudo-tty". This tricks bash into continuing to run indefinitely because it thinks it is connected to an interactive TTY (even though you have no way to interact with that particular TTY if you don't pass -i). Anyway, this should do the trick too:
$ docker run -t -d centos:latest
Not 100% sure whether -t will produce other weird interactions; maybe leave a comment below if it does.
Hi this issue is because docker containers exit if there is no running application in the container.
-d
option is just to run a container in deamon mode.
So the trick to make your container continuously running is point to a shell file in docker which will keep your application running.You can try with a start.sh file
Eg: docker run -d centos sh /yourlocation/start.sh
This start.sh should point to a never ending application.
In case if you dont want any application to be running,you can install monit which will keep your docker container running.
Please let us know if these two cases worked for you to keep your container running.
All the best
You can accomplish what you want with either:
docker run -t -d <image-name>
or
docker run -i -d <image-name>
or
docker run -it -d <image-name>
The command parameter as suggested by other answers (i.e. tail -f /dev/null) is completely optional, and is NOT required to get your container to stay running in the background.
Also note the Docker documentation suggests that combining -i and -t options will cause it to behave like a shell.
See:
https://docs.docker.com/engine/reference/run/#foreground
I have this code snippet run from the ENTRYPOINT in my docker file:
while true
do
echo "Press [CTRL+C] to stop.."
sleep 1
done
Run the built docker image as:
docker run -td <image name>
Log in to the container shell:
docker exec -it <container id> /bin/bash
execute command as follows :
docker run -t -d <image-name>
if you want to specify port then command as below:
docker run -t -d -p <port-no> <image-name>
verify the running container using following command:
docker ps
Docker container exits if task inside is done, so if you want to keep it alive even if it does not have any job or already finished them, you can do docker run -di image. After you do docker container ls you will see it running.
Docker requires your command to keep running in the foreground. Otherwise, it thinks that your applications stops and shutdown the container.
So if your docker entry script is a background process like following:
/usr/local/bin/confd -interval=30 -backend etcd -node $CONFIG_CENTER &
The '&' makes the container stop and exit if there are no other foreground process triggered later.
So the solution is just remove the '&' or have another foreground CMD running after it, such as
tail -f server.log
If you are using CMD at the end of your Dockerfile, what you can do is adding the code at the end. This will only work if your docker is built on ubuntu, or any OS that can use bash.
&& /bin/bash
Briefly the end of your Dockerfile will look like something like this.
...
CMD ls && ... && /bin/bash
So if you have anything running automatically after you run your docker image, and when the task is complete the bash terminal will be active inside your docker. Thereby, you can enter you shell commands.
Maybe it is just me but on CentOS 7.3.1611 and Docker 1.12.6 but I ended up having to use a combination of the answers posted by #VonC & #Christopher Simon to get this working reliably. Nothing I did before this would stop the container from exiting after it ran CMD successfully. I am starting oracle-xe-11Gr2 and sshd.
Dockerfile
...
RUN ssh-keygen -t rsa -f /etc/ssh/ssh_host_rsa_key -N '' && systemctl enable sshd
...
CMD /etc/init.d/oracle-xe start && /sbin/sshd && tail -f /dev/null
Then adding -d -t and -i to run
docker run --shm-size=2g --name oracle-db -d -t -i -p 5022:22 -p 5080:8080 -p 1521:1521 centos-oracle:7.3.1611
Finally after hours of bashing my head against the wall
ssh -v root#127.0.0.1 -p 5022
...
root#127.0.0.1's password:
debug1: Authentication succeeded (password).
For whatever reason the above will exit after executing CMD if the tail -f is removed, or any of the -t -d -i options are omitted.
I had the same issue, just opening another terminal with a bash on it worked for me :
create container:
docker run -d mcr.microsoft.com/mssql/server:2019-CTP3.0-ubuntu
containerid=52bbc9b30557
start container:
docker start 52bbc9b30557
start bash to keep container running:
docker exec -it 52bbc9b30557 bash
start process you need:
docker exec -it 52bbc9b30557 /path_to_cool_your_app
Running docker with interactive mode might solve the issue.
Here is the example for running image with and without interactive mode
chaitra#RSK-IND-BLR-L06:~/dockers$ sudo docker run -d -t -i test_again1.0
b6b9a942a79b1243bada59db19c7999cfff52d0a8744542fa843c95354966a18
chaitra#RSK-IND-BLR-L06:~/dockers$ sudo docker ps
CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES
chaitra#RSK-IND-BLR-L06:~/dockers$ sudo docker run -d -t -i test_again1.0 bash
c3d6a9529fd70c5b2dc2d7e90fe662d19c6dad8549e9c812fb2b7ce2105d7ff5
chaitra#RSK-IND-BLR-L06:~/dockers$ sudo docker ps
CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES
c3d6a9529fd7 test_again1.0 "bash" 2 seconds ago Up 1 second awesome_haibt
You can simply use:
docker container run -d -it <container name or id> /bin/bash
I have explained it in the following post that has the same question.
How to retain docker alpine container after "exit" is used?
I was also facing the same problem but in a different manner. When I create the docker containers. it automatically stops the unused containers which are just running in the background. Sometimes it also stops the containers that are in the use.
In my situation, this is because of the permission of the docker.sock files it earlier has.
what you have to do is :-
Install docker again.(As i work on ubuntu i install it from here)
Run the command to change the permissions.
sudo chmod 666 /var/run/docker.sock
Install docker-compose (this is optional as I have compose file to create many containers together)
sudo curl -L "https://github.com/docker/compose/releases/download/1.26.0/docker-compose-$(uname -s)-$(uname -m)" -o /usr/local/bin/docker-compose
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/docker-compose
check for the version to ensure that I have the latest one and not get problem with some deprications.
Then I run the docker container build.
Argument order matters
Jersey Beans answer (all 3 examples) worked for me. After quite a bit of trial and error I realized that the order of the arguments matter.
Keeps the container running in the background:
docker run -t -d <image-name>
Keeps the container running in the foreground: docker run <image-name> -t -d
It wasn't obvious to me coming from a Powershell background.
if you want to operate on the container, you need to run it in foreground to keep it alive.
There are multiple options out there to run the container in foreground/detached state. But if you still feel the issue is not resolved, you can try troubleshooting the issue by viewing the logs.
sudo docker logs -f >> container.log
additionally you can also use --details to show extra details provided to logs.
Incorrect Path to App in Dockerfile:
I was migrating an application from a RHEL server to a Docker container using Alpine Linux.
No errors during the build, so I was surprised to see the container immediately exit!
First port of call:
docker logs <containerID>
This revealed the path of the binary I had supplied to CMD in the Dockerfile was bogus:
line 0: /sbin/postfix: not found
Well that told me how things were broken, but not specifically where: I still required the correct path for the binary in Alpine Linux...
Troubleshooting:
Googling didn't reveal the correct path to it, so I added the following line to my Dockerfile:
RUN which postfix
I then reviewed my build logging- provided by the below command appended to my build command- to retrieve the value of RUN which postfix
--progress=plain > /path/to/build.log 2>&1
The Fix:
I deleted this test build, supplied the correct path- /usr/sbin/postfix - to CMD in the Dockerfile, deleted RUN which postfix and ran another build.
Voila; the process now remained up.
So a duff path was causing the container to immediately exit...
These 4 commands all work to keep your docker container running:
docker run -td centos
docker run -dt centos
docker run -t -d centos
docker run -d -t centos
Firstly, You need to check if any container is running
Type command,
docker ps -all
If any container is running then stop them
Type command,
docker stop Container Id
Now, Finally run the docker by using below command..........
docker run -t -p 2020:3000 dockerImageName
Hence, Open your google chrome and visit on localhost:2020
Congrats :)