Linux System Administrator, Website Developer
Docker is quickly sweeping over the server hosting industry due to it's amazing benefits over regular hosting.
Containerisation, most often achieved with Docker, allows you to have multiple isolated services on the same host. A docker container is like it's own mini linux server that shares a kernel with the host. This means different docker containers on the same host can have conflicting depedencies, services, and even ports without worry.
Containerisation starkly contrasts with a standard virtual machine. A virtual machine emulates it's own hardware and runs its kernel separate from the host. This traditional approach has benefits in security, but gives a performance hit due to it's emulated nature. You have to emulate and run a whole second computer, which often scales poorly. This is where the appeal of docker comes from.
The selling point of docker containers are their isolated manner. Separate containers on the same machine can hold different dependencies without introducing dependency conflict.
Docker containers can be shared with registries. The public registry where anyone can use your container, or a private registry where custom rules can be applied such as security vulnerability scanning.
Deploy docker to any docker host. It just works. Streamline this process with a CI/CD pipeline for automatic container building, vulnerability scanning/signing, and deployment.
Many game-servers, especially ones like FiveM and Unturned, often have secondary services like SnailyCAD or QbCore. These can be integrated directly into existing infrastructure like Pterodactyl panel for a seamless experience with the use of custom developed eggs.
Other amazing things like can be hosted too. Web servers, discord bots, Mumble/Teamspeak servers, and whatever else you can imagine.
Tools like Kubernetes and Traefik can be used to ensure high availability. Fail over, and auto container spin-up during high-load.
Docker containers grant insight into containers by offering CPU, RAM, Network, and other resource stats
Deploy items such as Grafana or Portainer to manage containers with beautiful web interfaces
Automate container backups by cloning the whole container filesystem or image-based backups
Docker offers amazing flexibility and adaptability to work with almost anything on almost every server
Deploy a container to any docker host and it just works