Customize Dev Containers in VS Code with Dockerfiles and Docker Compose

let's explore how you can use Docker files and Docker compos to customize your Dev containers in vs code Dev containers provide a consistent and reproducible development environment and work by running a Docker container now for simpler configurations you don't really need to do much with Docker in order to get started this is because a lot of the container build configuration is abstracted out by simply referencing an image in the dev container. Json file but if you're looking for a more customized Dev container setup or are just someone who really loves Docker then then you've probably wondered how you can use Docker more in your Dev containers if that's you then you're in the right place because in today's video I'm going to show you how to further customize your Dev containers by using Docker files Docker compos and even a combination of both everything I'm going to go over is available in this Dev container guide so make sure to check that out let's start off by seeing how you can incorporate a Docker file into your Dev container a Docker file is a file that contains the instructions for building an image they are a great way to extend images add additional packages and make minor edits to images to start in vs code with the dev containers extension installed run the dev containers add Dev container configuration files command this will show a list of available Dev container definitions that you can use for different text Stacks I'm going to select the Ubuntu container this will generate AEV container folder with a Dev container. Json file in it when we inspect the dev container. Json file we see that it simply has a name and an image property that references this container image instead of directly referencing the image in the dev container. Json I'd rather reference a Docker file which will build the specified image and install a package so let's see how we can adapt this to use a Docker file instead first I'm going to create a file called Docker file in it I'm going to specify the base image that I want to use which will be that same Ubuntu image then I'm going to install which is a package used for graphic editing next I'm going to head back to my Dev container. Json and remove the IM image property instead I'll add the build Docker file property here I'll specify to use the docker file that I just created and since I place the docker file in the same path as my Dev container. Json file I can simply reference it as Docker file and that's it now when I go to start my Dev container the docker file will automatically be built and I'll have my image with installed there are a lot of other Dev container. Json properties that you can leverage with Docker files all of which can be found in the dev container open specific documentation while we just saw how to create a Docker file from scratch you can always reuse any Docker file that you already have and you can use a Docker file when authoring an image that you can share with others known as a pre-built image we have an entire video on prebuilds if you'd like to learn more let's check out another way you can further customize your Dev container with Docker compose Docker compost is a great way to define a multicontainer development environment rather than adding things like databases to your Docker file you can instead reference existing images for these services in a single yaml configuration file and focus your Dev containers content on tools and utilities needed for development to see this in action let's again start with our image-based devc container. Json file I'm going to create a Docker composed. yaml file in the same directory and I'm going to go ahead and copy and paste the configuration into here then we'll go over it so Docker compos will list the different services that we want to have in our environment so in this case we want to have a text stack that includes our Dev container and a postgress database in the dev container properties we will reference that same image that we've been using this volumes workspaces cached value will Mount the workspace folder from the local Source Street into the dev container the network mode service DB value puts the dev container on the same network as the database so that it can access it on Local Host and the Sleep Infinity command will keep the container alive until we tell it to stop in this DB section uses the post image with a few settings configured so Docker compos will know how to configure our postgress instance in our environment now we need to reference the docker composed. yaml in the dev container. Json we'll remove the image property and replace it with a few different properties first the docker composed file which will be the docker composed. yaml that we just created the service property which indicates which service in the docker composed. yaml is the dev container and we named that service Dev container and the workspace folder which indicates where to mount the workspace folder and the open specification once again has a lot of great documentation on the dev container dojason properties you can use with Docker compose now when the dev container is started we have our Docker container configured with the postgress database and Dev container image now let's see how you can seamlessly combine these two scenarios by using a Docker file with Docker compose if we look at this Dev container created from the docker compose we can see that is not installed so I'm going to take that same docker file that we created in our first demo and reference it in the docker composed. yaml file so that we can have that package installation to do so we can replace the image property in the docker composed. yaml with the build property this then has a nested property for context which will have the value of dot to indicate that the docker file is in the same directory as the docker composed. yaml and the docker file property which will have the value Docker file since that's the name of our file you do not need to make any additional changes to the dev container. Json as we've gone through each of these scenarios notice how the dev container. Json still stays simple and streamlined when we rebuild the dev container this now combines the power of our Docker compos configuration with our Docker files Custom Image build Dev containers are a powerful tool that enable you to have a consistent development environment that can be spun up almost instantly today we learned how to leverage Docker files and Docker compos to take your Dev containers customization to the next level to learn more about everything can do with Dev containers make sure to head over to the containers. dev site for helpful guides and documentation and don't forget to subscribe to our YouTube channel so you can watch our other videos showcasing how to make the most of your Dev containers happy coding

Channel: Visual Studio Code

Views: 27,434

Keywords: vscode, visual studio code, vs code

Id: p9L7YFqHGk4

Length: 6min 16sec (376 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 31 2024