Remote Docker

This project uses Docker to create an environment where you can run containers on a remote host, in such a way that your local working directory is visible to the container and optionally use X11 to use a GUI.

This allows you to launch Firefox inside a Docker container, using your local ~/Downloads directory, but without access to the rest of your file-system.

You can use this same system to run the latest version of git - when for example your copy of openssh is out of date and github updates the formats of keys - again, or use apt to install an application as a Docker container, or trial some new source without impacting your local environment.

If you want to run a specific version of Python, you can do that without needing to install it locally.

This uses fuse sshfs to reverse mount the file-system (from the docker-machine to your workstation), create a docker-volume, then mount that on the container with the working directory set to the mount and taking care of UID and GID.

Terms and Assumptions

The term workstation refers to your "local" environment, where your files live, where you search the web and do your work.

The term docker-machine represents a "remote" environment, accessible via ssh that has Docker installed. I use a minimal Debian install, but it could be anything accessible via ssh.

The docker-machine is called docker.local and can be connected to by the local user as docker@docker.local. Similarly, the workstation can be resolved by its hostname from the docker-machine and you can connect to your username from the docker-machine to the workstation.

Authentication via ssh must be passwordless, use ssh-copy-id to set it up.

How it works

The underlying logic does not depend on a local installation of Docker. It uses ssh to run Docker commands on the remote host. The point of this is that it could run across the Internet, not just to a VM like I'm using it today.

To share files between the Docker container and the local file-system, these scripts use docker-mount and docker-umount commands. These commands mount a local directory to a remote directory so it can be used as a Docker volume inside the container. This is achieved in several steps:

Connect to the docker-machine over ssh.
Create a unique empty directory (using uuidgen).
Use sshfs from the docker-machine to the workstation to mount the local directory to the new unique remote directory.
Create a Docker volume of that mounted directory.
Start a container with that Docker volume.

The docker-umount does the reverse, removing the volume, un-mounting the sshfs mount, removing the directory.

Note that currently the console displays "Creating volume:" and "Removing volume:" messages. If you know how to make those go away, please provide a patch. (Yes, I'm aware that I'm echoing those strings, it's the volume id from Docker that really needs hiding that I cannot control.)

Usage

You should be able to run the docker command as if Docker is installed on your local machine and have it execute remotely. The docker.x11 command should act as-if you launched an X11 application on your local machine. The docker-run command will mount the current directory inside the container and set the working directory to that same path.

I use this by putting all these scripts in ~/bin. On my workstation, I use ~/docker/itmaze/ to store any containers built with apt-docker. All images built using this are tagged itmaze/{xyz}:latest. I am the "default" maintainer for such images. If you do upload any images, you should update the email address (and the tag).

You can create more than one mount and use more than one volume in the same container at the same time. This is useful if you want to run the aws-cli or git command and provide access to ~/.ssh or ~/.aws as well as the current directory.

Scripts

The scripts in use are:

docker, runs Docker commands across ssh on the docker-machine.
docker-run, implements the docker run command by connecting the current directory to a Docker volume and then adding the volume mount to the docker run command. Uses docker-mount and docker-umount.
docker-mount, creates a unique directory on the docker-machine to use as a mount point for sshfs. Mounts the current workstation directory via sshfs, and creates a Docker volume from that mount. Uses uuidgen.
docker-umount, removes the Docker volume, un-mounts sshfs, removes the directory on the docker-machine.
docker.x11, uses ssh x-forwarding to get the X11 packets between the docker-machine and the workstation. Security Warning, this uses --net=host
apt-docker, attempts to create a minimal container that installs a single Debian application in a debian:stable-slim container and then creates a symlink between the container and your local ~/bin directory, making it look like you just installed an application locally.
make_dockerfile, create a minimal Dockerfile and launch command, used by apt-docker.
docker-build, implements docker build, using a tar file of the current directory, sent over ssh to the build command running on the docker-machine.
docker.build.me, build the current directory as a container, tagged with the directory name. Uses docker-build.
docker-compose, the local directory is mounted on the docker-machine and the docker-compose command is run inside that directory. Please read the docker-compose caveats below. Uses docker-mount and docker-umount.
docker-machine, execute docker-machine commands on the docker-machine.
docker-search, run docker search --no-trunc on the docker-machine.
docker.ssh.cmd, the underlying ssh command that actually sends the docker commands to the docker-machine. You can edit the 'userName' and 'hostName' variables here.

Docker-Compose Caveats

The docker-compose command creates a mount-point on the docker-machine in much the same way as used in other scripts. It even creates a docker volume, which isn't actually used. The mount-point is used as the working directory for running the actual docker-compose command on the docker-machine.

Unlike the other commands above, the docker-compose command does not use uuidgen to create the unique volume name. It uses the md5sum of the full path of the current working directory instead. It appears that the current directory name is used in the default naming convention when containers, volumes and networks are created by the compose command. Having a unique volume name meant that this directory name would change at every invocation, which meant that the default names changed every time, resulting in docker-compose up and docker-compose down receiving a different directory name, and thus not being able to destroy the containers, volumes and networks it created since they would have a different (unknown) name.

By using the md5sum of the current path the mount point name stays the same every time, making the behaviour more predictable, but it isn't as robust, since renaming a directory at any point in the path will change the md5sum.

Suggestions on how to improve this are welcome.

Requirements

There are requirements for both the docker-machine and the workstation. These are different.

One thing both have in common is that you need to be able to ssh between both without using a password. ssh-copy-id is the way to make that happen. If you get an error about missing an identity, create one using ssh-keygen. This is required, since we're using ssh from the workstation to the docker-machine to execute Docker commands and we're using ssh from the docker-machine to the workstation to mount a directory using sshfs.

Workstation requirements:

ssh
sshd
uuidgen (uuid-runtime)
fromdos (tofrodos)

Docker-Machine requirements:

docker
ssh
sshd
sshfs
write permission on the home directory of the docker user

Examples

The examples directory shows some of the ways that this tool can be used. It is incomplete and as I go through my existing use of this code (70+ containers), the example directory will likely grow.

To use a container, I add a symlink between my ~/bin and a launch file. For example: ~/bin/speedtest -> ./examples/speedtest/launch

firefox-esr, runs firefox across X11, linking the /home/docker/Downloads directory to the /home/onno/Downloads directory, so that the mount point inside the container has the same path as my actual ~/Downloads directory. Update the username to reflect your own user.
git, runs git in the current directory, but mounts the ~/.ssh directory so it can access your keys.
speedtest, simple example of running a docker command without any volume mounting.

Bugs

There are times when volumes do not un-mount cleanly. Use docker volume prune -f to remove all unused volumes.
Fixed: 58546e7 The quote handling isn't clean, sometimes double quoting is required. This appears to be an ssh feature. Using a git container to commit for example requires some shenanigans: git commit -m "'Initial commit.'"

Kittens Clause

Fair warning: This isn't feature complete and probably kills kittens.
Until a few days ago this was a set of scripts on my workstation. Today it's a github project. If you break it, you get to keep both parts.
Naming isn't consistent.
There are times when a command doesn't "come back", likely the Docker console is "helping". You can kill the Docker container from another shell using docker ps and docker kill.
I have tested this on a bare machine to ensure that it should work for you out of the box, but it might not. If it doesn't please file an issue and I'll have a look.
Feel free to get in touch, but if you want to fix something or suggest a feature, please create an issue or supply a patch.
This was inspired by the pioneering hard work by Jess Frazelle who introduced me to the idea of running everything inside Docker. My workstation isn't quite there yet, but it's getting closer every day.
I blame Corey Quinn for asking silly questions and my mother for teaching me not to keep my big mouth shut - enjoy!

ITmaze/remote-docker