This makes containers much more suitable for horizontal scaling and resource-restricted environments. VMs, on the other hand, would need that 500 mb per virtual machine.

In a containerized environment, this 500 mb can be shared between hundreds of containers assuming they are are all running the same base image.

Imagine a container image that requires 500 mb. This shared access to the host OS resources enables performance and resource efficiencies not found in other virtualization methods. Unlike traditional virtual machines, container images give each of its instances shared access to the host operating system through a container runtime. This everything-it-needs approach helps silo application concerns, providing improved systems security and a tighter scope for debugging. This allows for containers to be spun up irrespective of the surrounding environment. These images are created with their own system tools, libraries, code, runtime, and associated dependencies hardcoded. Images are layered alternatives to virtual machine disks that allow applications to be abstracted from the environment in which they are actually being run.Ĭontainer images are executable, isolated software with access to the host's resources, network, and filesystem. Put simply, containers are running instances of container images. This post will address what exactly containers are, why they are proving to be so advantageous, how people are using them, and best practices for containerizing your Node.js applications with Docker. Lighter and more resource efficient than traditional virtual machines, containers offer IT organizations new opportunities in version control, deployment, scaling, and security. Application containers have emerged as a powerful tool in modern software development.

Nodejs dockerfile