Docker, Google, CoreOS, Microsoft, IBM, Linux and More Working On Common Container Standard

In the recent past, there has been a fast growth of software industry’s interest and usage in the containers and Docker has strengthened its position as the de facto container standard. But, from some time, an imminent collision between Dockers and other container solutions was on course.

Now, Docker, Google, CoreOS, Microsoft and Amazon are working on a new standard for the software container in collaboration with the Linux Foundation. The other members coming along in this endeavor are Cisco, EMC, Fujitsu, Goldman Sachs, IBM, HP, Intel, Joyent, Pivotal, Red Hat, VMware, Apcera and Mesosphere. So, it looks like everyone who is responsible to build and who can build an ever-growing container ecosystem, have come together to serve a common purpose.

Back in December 2014, CoreOS launched its own container technology and the App Container Image (the appc) to define a standard for containers. With this new common container standard, the software community is expecting to define a standard that will work across all container technologies based on Docker, CoreOS and others.

Now with the common container standard, the developers will have the power to package and run their applications in real time with a neutral standard.

The project called the Open Container Project (OCP) was launched on Monday under the hood of the Linux Foundation. The Docker CEO said: “The idea of trying to set up an industry standard with Docker Inc. contributing really started about three weeks ago, and it started picking up steam in the last week.” 

In the project, Docker is donating its container format and runtime to create an open community and users will have the choice the best technology suited for their job.

“We’re getting the contributions from Docker with the format and runtime that underpin container usage, and then we’re also getting the shared standard and vendor neutrality aspects that we’ve designed with app container,” Alex Polvi, CoreOS CEO said.

The official web release describes the guiding principles around OCP standards as follows:

• Not be bound to higher level constructs such as a particular client or orchestration stack
• Not be tightly associated with any particular commercial vendor or project and
• Be portable across a wide variety of operating systems, hardware, CPU architectures, public clouds, etc.

The specifications of the open container will be available at this link in the upcoming weeks https://github.com/opencontainers/specs.
Docker’s container format and runtime is available at https://github.com/opencontainers/runc.

Source: fossbyte

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