Sample App Docker Run

In this lesson we craft the docker run commands to run our containerized application.

1. Building the Docker Images

First, we need to build our container images.

Because of the repo structure, we need to pass the -f flag to tell docker where our Dockerfiles live, and pass a context pointing to the correct subdirectory:

DOCKERCONTEXT_DIR:=../05-example-web-application/
DOCKERFILE_DIR:=../06-building-container-images/

docker build -t client-react-vite -f ${DOCKERFILE_DIR}/client-react/Dockerfile.3 ${DOCKERCONTEXT_DIR}/client-react/
docker build -t client-react-ngnix -f ${DOCKERFILE_DIR}/client-react/Dockerfile.5 ${DOCKERCONTEXT_DIR}/client-react/
docker build -t api-node -f ${DOCKERFILE_DIR}/api-node/Dockerfile.7 ${DOCKERCONTEXT_DIR}/api-node/
docker build -t api-golang -f ${DOCKERFILE_DIR}/api-golang/Dockerfile.6 ${DOCKERCONTEXT_DIR}/api-golang/

2. Create a Docker Network

Create a new Docker network called my-network:

docker network create my-network

Check that the network was created:

docker network ls

3. Run the Postgres Container

We will work our way forward, starting with the database and ending with our react client.

docker run -d \
  --name db \
  --network my-network \
  -e POSTGRES_PASSWORD=foobarbaz \
  -v pgdata:/var/lib/postgresql/data \
  -p 5432:5432 \
  --restart unless-stopped \
  postgres:15.1-alpine

We have seen commands like this to start a PostgeSQL container, but now we are adding:

• -d: to run it in the background
• --network my-network: to attach it to the network we created
• --restart unless-stopped: to restart the DB if it crashes

4. Run the Node API Container

DATABASE_URL:=postgres://postgres:foobarbaz@db:5432/postgres
docker run -d \
  --name api-node \
  --network my-network \
  -e DATABASE_URL=${DATABASE_URL} \
  -p 3000:3000 \
  --restart unless-stopped \
  api-node

One option worth calling out is:

• -e DATABASE_URL=${DATABASE_URL}: which we use to pass the database credentials to the application

5. Run the Golang API Container

DATABASE_URL:=postgres://postgres:foobarbaz@db:5432/postgres
docker run -d \
  --name api-golang \
  --network my-network \
  -e DATABASE_URL=${DATABASE_URL} \
  -p 8080:8080 \
  --restart unless-stopped \
  api-golang

You will notice this is nearly identical to the api-node command except it uses a different container image and publishes a different port.

6. Run the Vite and Nginx Clients

We will run both the development server with vite as well as the more production ready nginx based client:

docker run -d \
		--name client-react-vite \
		--network my-network \
		-v ${PWD}/client-react/vite.config.js:/usr/src/app/vite.config.js \
		-p 5173:5173 \
		--restart unless-stopped \
		client-react-vite

docker run -d \
		--name client-react-nginx \
		--network my-network \
		-p 80:8080 \
		--restart unless-stopped \
		client-react-ngnix

The options worth noting are:

• -v ${PWD}/client-react/vite.config.js:/usr/src/app/vite.config.js: which mounts a new vite config file in at runtime
• -p 80:8080: to publish port 8080 in the container to port 80 on our localhost

Cleaning Up

To stop and remove all of these containers we can use:

docker stop db api-node api-golang client-react-vite client-react-nginx

docker rm db api-node api-golang client-react-vite client-react-nginx

docker network rm my-network