The third tool, alongside Docker and Docker Compose, which we installed during Chapter 1, Installing Docker Locally was Docker Machine; this is a command line tool which allows you to manage both local and remote Docker hosts.
In this chapter, we are going to look at the basic usage of three of the public cloud drivers by using Docker Machine to provision Docker hosts in them. We will be launching our Docker hosts in the following:
- Digital Ocean https://www.digitalocean.com/
- Amazon Web Services - https://aws.amazon.com/
- Microsoft Azure - https://azure.microsoft.com/
Docker Machine can connect to the following services, provision a Docker host, and configure your local Docker client to be able to communicate with the newly launched remote instance the following:
As well as the three public cloud providers already mentioned, Docker Machine also supports:
- Google Compute Engine - https://cloud.google.com/compute/
- Rackspace - http://www.rackspace.co.uk/cloud/
- IBM Softlayer http://www.softlayer.com
- Exoscale - https://www.exoscale.ch/
- VMware vCloud Air - http://vcloud.vmware.com/
- It also supports the following self-hosted platforms:
- OpenStack - https://www.openstack.org/
- Microsoft Hyper-V - http://www.microsoft.com/virtualization/
- VMware vSphere - http://www.vmware.com/uk/products/vsphere/
Also, it allows you to launch Docker hosts locally using VirtualBox - https://www.virtualbox.org/. This is great if your local workstation doesn't meet the minimum specifications for Docker for Mac or Windows.