Rancher Desktop
Rancher Desktop, from SUSE, is an Apache 2.0 desktop application that gives developers containers and Kubernetes on Linux, macOS and Windows. It is a popular alternative to Docker Desktop.
Key concepts #
- Container engine: choose dockerd (moby) with the
dockercommand, or containerd withnerdctl. Only one runs at a time. See containerd vs dockerd. - Kubernetes: a K3s cluster with a selectable version and Traefik as the ingress controller. See Kubernetes in Rancher Desktop.
- Linux VM: Lima on macOS and Linux, WSL 2 on Windows.
- Bundled tools:
docker,nerdctl, Docker Compose,kubectl,helmandrdctl, its own command line. See rdctl.
Learn it #
Install Rancher Desktop on your system and follow the rest of the series Docker and Rancher Desktop.
More tutorials that use Rancher Desktop
- Docker and Rancher Desktop Troubleshooting: Common Errors and Fixes
- Docker Basics: Containers, Images and Registries Explained
- Convert Docker Compose to Kubernetes: Kompose and Manual Migration
- Docker Networking Explained: Bridge Networks, Ports and DNS
- Terraform Docker Provider: Manage Containers and Images as Code
- Push Docker Images from Rancher Desktop to Amazon ECR
- Docker Volumes and Bind Mounts: Persist Data in Containers