Containers are supported on Windows 10 and Windows Servers

Sep 14, 2017 16:35 GMT  ·  By

Canonical's Dustin Kirkland announced that the company behind the popular Ubuntu Linux OS recently teamed up with Microsoft to enable Ubuntu containers to run on Windows systems with Hyper-V isolation.

If you've ever dreamed of running your own Linux apps on a Windows machine, using your favorite GNU/Linux distro, which, in this case, is Ubuntu, we have some good news for you, as it's now possible to run Docker containers on Windows 10 and Windows Servers.

The technology leverages the Ubuntu Linux operating system as a hosting base, the Docker container engine and the Hyper-V virtualization for running Linux applications on Windows. All you'll need is a 64-bit x86 PC with 8GB RAM and be part of the Windows Insider Program.

"Canonical and Microsoft have teamed up to deliver a truly special experience — running Ubuntu containers with Hyper-V Isolation on Windows 10 and Windows Servers," said Dustin Kirkland, Vice President Ubuntu Product and Strategy at Canonical. "You should be up and running in minutes!"

Here's how to launch Ubuntu containers with Hyper-V isolation

In his recent blog announcement, Dustin Kirkland shares a tutorial with easy-to-follow instructions and screenshots for those interested on getting started with running Ubuntu containers with Hyper-V Isolation on Windows operating systems. At the moment, these can only run on Windows 10 and Windows Server machines.

So make sure you follow those instructions, and should be able to launch Ubuntu containers with Hyper-V isolation just by running the command below in a Windows Powershell. If you're having issues with the tutorial, don't hesitate to join the official Ubuntu Forums or Ask Ubuntu for support. Ubuntu is also available as an app from the Windows Store on Windows 10.

docker run -it ubuntu bash