A Brief History of Docker

Containers Before Docker

At the core of Docker Containers is the practice of compartmentalization: keeping processes separate, while managing (and minimizing) access between them. The first signs of the compartmentalization process that would become Docker came in 1979 with Unix v7. This introduced the chroot system call, allowing users to change a process’s root directory, restricting it from accessing files outside of its scope. More than twenty years later in 2000, the operating system FreeBSD introduced FreeBSD Jails. These jails separated the system into independently functional segments. Fully comparable, large-scale container systems wouldn’t be released until 2008 with LinuX Containers, or LXC. Like Docker, LXC can package an app’s full requirements and files together to more easily transfer between environments. Docker itself would follow 3 years later in 2011.

When you’re the founder of Docker, you don’t have to worry so much about your LinkedIn appearance — Hykes’ page sports a default profile picture and an admittedly cute turtle.

Dawn of Docker

2011 saw the launch of Docker — only, it wasn’t called Docker at first. The company started out as dotCloud and was launched with the help of Y Combinator. Its founder was Solomon Hykes*, who was only 22 at the time of the product’s launch. In 2013, Docker was released as an open source version of dotCloud. After its explosion in popularity, the company changed its name accordingly.

*and according to an archived version of the dotCloud webpage, Sebastien Pahl, though he tends to get less credit

What’s With the Whale?

Well, that’s Moby Dock! He was named by popular vote. According to the company, Moby is “carrying a stack of containers on its way to deliver those to you.” Moby even has a real-life counterpart: Molly Dock, who was “adopted” by the company in 2015 (her scientific tracking was sponsored with a donation of $25,000). Molly was first spotted in 1992 near San Francisco — a sweet homage to the company’s birthplace.

Sources

https://blog.aquasec.com/a-brief-history-of-containers-from-1970s-chroot-to-docker-2016

https://web.archive.org/web/20140702231323/https://www.dotcloud.com/about.html

https://www.crunchbase.com/person/solomon-hykes

https://www.linkedin.com/in/solomonhykes/

https://www.whitesourcesoftware.com/resources/blog/the-hidden-stories-behind-the-open-source-logos-we-all-love/

https://www.networkworld.com/article/2942838/docker-the-container-company-with-a-whale-of-a-logo-adopted-a-real-whale.html