The annual “Run For The Roses” horse race has been held since 1875. In that time, there have been only 22 wire-to-wire race leaders/winners. Indeed, simple statistics favor the jockey and horse who can seize the lead at the right moment. For the strongest horses, that may be the start. But for most horses, the jockey will launch his steed forward when it best suits the horse and its racing profile. This simple (and complicated) approach is also true for technology adoption.
Docker And Early Technology Adoption
Five years ago, Docker exploded onto the IT scene. Originally, Docker was being adopted exclusively by tech savvy companies. And some of these early adopters have taken keen advantage of their foresight. But like horses that leap too soon, many companies have already flashed into existence – and then been extinguished by an inability to deliver on their promised value.
Now that Docker is over five years old, how many companies are adopting it? According to some surveys, Docker use in the marketplace is substantially over 25%. And I would be willing to bet that if you include businesses playing with Docker, then the number is probably more than 40%. But when you consider that five years is a normal budget/planning horizon, then you must expect that this number will do nothing but increase in the next few years. One thing is certain, the majority of applications in use within businesses are not yet containerized.
So there is still time to take advantage of Docker (and containers). If you haven’t yet jumped on board, then it’s time to get into the water. And if you are already invested in containers, then it’s time to double-down and accelerate your investment. [By the way, this is the “stay competitive” strategy. The only way to truly leap ahead is to use Docker (and other containers) in unique and innovative ways.]
Technology Adoption At Home
Adoption of containers at home is still nascent. Yes, there have been a few notable exceptions. Specifically, one of the very best uses of containers is the Hass.io infrastructure that can be used to host Home Assistant on a Raspberry Pi. Now that the new Raspberry Pi 4 is generally available, it is incredibly simple (and adorably cheap) to learn about – and economically exploit – containers at home.
My Personal Experiences
I’ve been using Docker at home for over a year. And now that I’ve switched all of my traditional computing platforms from Windows to Linux, I’m now using Docker (and other containers) for nearly all of my personal and professional platforms. And this past week, I finally cut over to Docker for all of my web-based systems. My new Docker infrastructure includes numerous images (and containers). I have a few containers for data collection (e.g., glances, portainer). I have moved my personal entertainment systems to Docker containers (e.g. plex, tautulli). And I’ve put some infrastructure in place for future containers (e.g., traefik, watchtower). And in the upcoming months, I’ll be moving my entire TICK stack into Docker containers.
Bottom Line
If you haven’t started to exploit containers, then it’s not too late. Your employer is probably using containers already. But they will be moving even more swiftly towards widespread adoption. Therefore, it’s not too late to jump onto the commercial bandwagon. And if you want to do something really new and innovative, I’d suggest using containers at home. You’ll learn a lot. And you may find a niche where you could build a highly scalable appliance that exploits highly containerized building blocks.