Apple Container

Dagger can be used with any OCI-compatible container runtime, including container from Apple.

:::warning The support for Apple's container is still early and experimental. :::

How it works

By default, Dagger tries to invoke the docker executable at some points during the invocation of dagger. Since container is partially CLI-compatible with Docker, some functionality works out of the box, and there is a way to get running by combining a symbolic link named docker pointing to the container executable, together with the approach of Custom Runner support.

Prerequisites

• Apple's container installed and API server running on the host system, through container system start.

Example

To use container with Dagger:

Create a symbolic link in a superior PATH position as below:

sudo ln -s $(which container) /usr/local/bin/docker

Start the Dagger Engine using appropriate values for memory and cpus:

container run --rm -d \
    --memory 16G \
    --cpus 4 \
    --name dagger-engine-custom \
    registry.dagger.io/engine:v0.18.12

Set this environment variable wherever you want to reach your Dagger Engine:

export _EXPERIMENTAL_DAGGER_RUNNER_HOST=docker-container://dagger-engine-custom

:::info There is no container ps, so use container ls to check if the Dagger Engine is running. :::

Resources

If you have any questions about additional ways to use Apple's container with Dagger, join our Discord and ask your questions in our #macos channel.

About Apple's container

Apple's container is a tool for creating and running Linux containers using lightweight virtual machines on a Mac. It is written in Swift, and optimized for Apple silicon.