Canonical & Docker Partner For CS Docker Engine On Ubuntu

Canonical and Docker have teamed up for a  new commercial agreement that will see an integrated Commercially Supported (CS) Docker Engine offered on Ubuntu.

The firms said this development will make Ubuntu one of the first Linux distributions to provide enterprise-grade technical support and SLAs for Docker Engine.

Commercial Support

The integration of a commercially supported Docker Engine onto Ubuntu means that the larger Ubuntu community will be able to utilise all the benefits that a CS-supported version supplies.

It should be remembered that CS Docker Engine is a software subscription to Docker’s main product, but it is backed by business critical support. It includes orchestration capabilities that enables an operator to define a declarative state for the distributed applications running across a cluster of nodes.

Essentially then the agreement allows Ubuntu customers to gain official Docker support, a benefit not available from most Linux distributions. This makes it well suited to the business environment, as Ubuntu is widely used as a development platform in container-centric environments.

The agreement means that for joint customers, stable and maintained releases of Docker will be able available as ‘snap packages’ on Ubuntu.

Meanwhile Canonical will provide Level 1 and Level 2 technical support for CS Docker Engine, whereas Docker will provide Level 3 support.

“The combination of Ubuntu and Docker is popular for scale-out container operations, and this agreement ensures that our joint user base has the fastest and easiest path to production for CS Docker Engine devops,” said John Zannos, head of Cloud Alliances and Business Development, Canonical.

Docker Growth

In the summer multiple reports indicated that the open-source container technology is witnessing growing adoption, although there are some challenges to adoption.

Docker is a technology that enables organisations to run applications, but it isn’t just a technology used by small companies. In fact, most adoptions are apparently by organisations that are monitoring 500 or more server hosts.

Ubuntu of course is the most popular server Linux distribution currently, and earlier this year it ceased to develop its platform for aging 32-bit based chips.

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