Podman Desktop 1.11: Light mode, Kubernetes features, macOS improvements (opens in new tab)

(podman-desktop.io)

108 pointstwelvenmonkeys1y ago52 comments

52 comments

I'm remarkably impressed with Podman Desktop. I rarely use GUI tools as they rarely offer me more than what a CLI can, but Podman Desktop is becoming a sort of system dashboard or cockpit for me. It's getting quite feature rich. The k8s support is unexpected but appreciated, though I do wish it had better support for multiple kube config files. On the CLI I use aliases (sometimes env vars) to specify the kube config file, but in Podman desktop for some reason it won't use the env vars that it's supposed to. I built it such that there is no default cluster. It requires explicit specifying of the cluster. I did this intentionally so that commands never accidentally run against prod. With Podman Desktop, I can hack around the bug by symlinking ~/.kube/config to the one I want, but then my explicit specifying is gone and it's possible to accidentally be connected to prod when I think it's staging. My biggest feature request for Podman Desktop: support for multiple kube configs and let me label them with environment so it's immediately clear which env I'm talking to.

xnorswap1y ago

Used to be that people would wait ages for applications to get a "Dark mode", I find it funny how now we have to wait for "light mode" instead.

Even so, good to see that arriving. I've been experimenting recently and I've found podman very useful compared to my previous experiences trying to do containery stuff. ( Admittedly a very long time ago now which burned me and put me off trying again for a long time. )

outcoldman1y ago

Lol, I could not even guess that the "light mode" was the opposite of dark theme, not the term for being a "light" as opposed to "heavy". So I was so surprised to see only the description "that light mode is available now, and you can turn it on". What is light mode? Not a "mode", it is a "theme".

diego_sandoval1y ago

The CLI is the "light mode".

kenmacd1y ago

Like wayland, podman was one of those things that took a lot of "I'll give it another shot? Nope, not ready" before I could switch.

Lately the only real incompatibility I run in to with podman is that the handling of `RUN --mount=type=secret` in a Containerfile/Dockerfile is a bit broken (https://github.com/containers/buildah/issues/5282).

ndriscoll1y ago

Pretty much every program I interact with on Linux simply respects the system theme. I don't understand why light or dark "mode" for individual programs is even a thing.

betaby1y ago

Podman Destop is surprisingly bad on MacOS. It has a kind of proxy-like/userspace network driver. That means your tcp connection shown in a host system through `netstat`. ICPM is not implemented and always returns success. Try running `ping 66.0.0.0` or any other non-existing IP from the container and see. At that moment I'll continue using, well, podman in a Linux VM running UTM.

chrisldgk1y ago

If you haven’t tried it yet, I can recommend OrbStack[1] for container things on macOS. I don’t use it for anything more than spinning up dev DBs locally, but I know it supports Kubernetes in some form or another.

[1] https://orbstack.dev

wiseowise1y ago

https://docs.orbstack.dev/faq#open-source

Into the trash it goes.

3 more replies

gbalduzzi1y ago

I never used podman desktop but I LOVE OrbStack.

Compared to docker desktop it's night and day, it is so much more performant and I never had an issue with it, totally recommend.

shepherdjerred1y ago

I'm a very happy, paying OrbStack user. The UI is much more responsive that Docker Desktop. It also has a very unique debug shell [0] feature that allows you access to common tools even in minimal images.

[0]: https://docs.orbstack.dev/features/debug

twelvenmonkeysOP1y ago

I've edited the title to add more information on macOS. With this release we now implement Podman 5.1.0 which includes a MASSIVE speedup for AMD64 builds / running containers as well as improvements to the podman networking stack.

mrweasel1y ago

I would go so far at saying that Podman Desktop for macOS is non-functional. My understanding is that Podman Desktop will spin up some sort of Linux VM to do all the actual containerization, and the network/proxy is just a mess. For all I know Docker Desktop does the same, but if it does it's better at hiding it.

Docker Desktop also works perfectly well with AMD64 emulation and/or Rosetta.

rhatdan1y ago

Linux containers require a Linux kernel. Any tool on a MAC that is running containers locally is doing it in a VM.

WD-421y ago

For basic dev container stuff, I switched to podman and I'll not go back to Docker. It works great and it being daemonless is just a cherry on top.

dymk1y ago

I want to love it, but it's surprisingly difficult to set up a recent version on Debian / Ubuntu. As far as I can tell, even the latest stable Debian / Ubuntu have Podman 3.x in their apt package repositories, which is missing a bunch of features (latest is 5.x).

throwaway743541y ago

It's 4.9.3 for Ubuntu 24.04. Close enough, but it won't be updated in the forseeable future, so the gap will grow.

There are https://build.opensuse.org/repositories/devel:kubic:libconta... repos, but it's what it says on the tin: unstable. And its usage is discouraged from the upstream bug reporting point of view. Works fine to keep up with development, but I wouldn't use that for user-facing workloads.

gigatexal1y ago

Same. I have both limactl and podman setup but I think I’ll go all in on podman. On the Mac I was impressed how awesome podman is. Docker could have had this position but they need to make money and changed the license. More power to them. But the consequences are that I’ve moved.

eknkc1y ago

If you are on macOS, give OrbStack a shot. It works surprisingly well and fast.

iknowstuff1y ago

+1. Love OrbStack. It’s embarrassing how bad docker is by comparison.

If your company is paying for docker desktop, stop right now and switch to OrbStack.

antihero1y ago

I'll give it a shot - how useful are the Pro features?

bdcravens1y ago

I subscribed, but only to be license-compliant. I've never used a pro feature, though I've looked at things like the debug mode. Honestly I just use the same set of command line tools I'd use with the official Docker client.

k8sToGo1y ago

Does it keep things contained?

Does it mess up or clutter the system?

Currently I am using a Fusion VM to have something similar to WSL2 on Mac. Is this a better solution?

PufPufPuf1y ago

I'm a fan of Rancher Desktop -- it has everything integrated and working out of the box, it can even provide the CLI tools like docker, kubectl or helm for you.

On the other hand, in Podman Desktop, you can't even use an image from Podman Desktop docker in Podman Desktop kubernetes without extra steps. I'd recommend it only if you want Podman specifically. If you just want to run docker and/or kubernetes, I'd go with Rancher Desktop.

alyandon1y ago

The Rancher Desktop VM with k8s enabled has about 10% continuous cpu usage at idle on my 2019 MBP. I really wish there was something I could do to reduce that.

mdaniel1y ago

That is almost certainly the etcd binaries on the vm chatting to itself. I would expect k3s should have lower CPU usage as they (by default) jettison etcd for an embedded db

Having said that, aside from the general WTF of something burning CPU, does in impact you in some way? Battery drain, sluggish apps, memory hog (I'd bet on that one), other?

1 more reply

hedora1y ago

If you want something more general purpose, Canonical Multipass has a good sample docker setup. Annoyingly, This is the only Canonical product I can recommend at this point.

I use it with MacOS. I assume WSL is a better choice for Windows laptops, and there’s no reason to add a VM to get docker on Linux.

https://multipass.run/docs/docker-how-to

5kg1y ago

I liked Multipass until I ran into storage corruption issues like many others [1][2] and broke all my VMs. On MacOS, Multipass uses qemu in which the apple-hvf support isn't getting much updates after 2021 [3].

[1]: https://github.com/canonical/multipass/issues/3455 [2]: https://github.com/canonical/multipass/issues/3235 [3]: https://github.com/qemu/qemu/commits/master/accel/hvf

2 more replies

gbalduzzi1y ago

Has someone ever tried both Rancher Desktop and OrbStack on macOS?

I love OrbStack but I never heard of Rancher Desktop before, maybe I should try it

planewave1y ago

Yes! Maybe I’m always expecting the wrong thing with Podman Desktop, but I can’t ever get it to work the way I expect it to - on Windows or Mac.

Rancher Desktop, however, has been a breeze. Same with using Lima.[0]

With Lima:

  limactrl create template://docker

[0] https://lima-vm.io/

PufPufPuf1y ago

There's also Colima, which allows you to run "colima start --kubernetes" to set up everything with Lima. However it needs some additional setup with the CLI tooling, so I rather recommend Rancher Desktop.

...and on Linux running the actual docker daemon, of course.

asmor1y ago

Initial experience on random (fresh-ish install) Windows laptop: Bad. Creates VM, and then can't find it. Now I can install Hyper-V management tools to get rid of it...

Error: Command execution failed with exit code 125 Command execution failed with exit code 125 Error: vm "podman-machine-default" already exists on hypervisor

ethanpil1y ago

With all of these great improvements in recent months i'd love to see an updated roadmap... https://github.com/containers/podman-desktop/wiki/Roadmap

yeldarb1y ago

Anyone know if there’s a way to get access to devices in a container on MacOS yet? (Eg USB webcam, MPS or CUDA accelerator)

geerlingguy1y ago

I think Tart or one of the other more VM-like emulators was working on USB support at least; it's not a simple problem to solve, and I'm still not to the point I was with VirtualBox on Intel Macs in terms of being able to emulate any situation easily.

rhatdan1y ago

Look for krunkit for GPU/Cuda Accelerator. Should be much better support in podman 5.2 out next month, I believe.

You can use it now if you grab it from brew.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

52 comments

freedomben1y ago

xnorswap1y ago

Used to be that people would wait ages for applications to get a "Dark mode", I find it funny how now we have to wait for "light mode" instead.

outcoldman1y ago

diego_sandoval1y ago

The CLI is the "light mode".

kenmacd1y ago

Like wayland, podman was one of those things that took a lot of "I'll give it another shot? Nope, not ready" before I could switch.

ndriscoll1y ago

Pretty much every program I interact with on Linux simply respects the system theme. I don't understand why light or dark "mode" for individual programs is even a thing.

betaby1y ago

chrisldgk1y ago

[1] https://orbstack.dev

wiseowise1y ago

https://docs.orbstack.dev/faq#open-source

Into the trash it goes.

3 more replies

gbalduzzi1y ago

I never used podman desktop but I LOVE OrbStack.

Compared to docker desktop it's night and day, it is so much more performant and I never had an issue with it, totally recommend.

shepherdjerred1y ago

[0]: https://docs.orbstack.dev/features/debug

twelvenmonkeysOP1y ago

mrweasel1y ago

Docker Desktop also works perfectly well with AMD64 emulation and/or Rosetta.

rhatdan1y ago

Linux containers require a Linux kernel. Any tool on a MAC that is running containers locally is doing it in a VM.

WD-421y ago

For basic dev container stuff, I switched to podman and I'll not go back to Docker. It works great and it being daemonless is just a cherry on top.

dymk1y ago

throwaway743541y ago

It's 4.9.3 for Ubuntu 24.04. Close enough, but it won't be updated in the forseeable future, so the gap will grow.

gigatexal1y ago

eknkc1y ago

If you are on macOS, give OrbStack a shot. It works surprisingly well and fast.

iknowstuff1y ago

+1. Love OrbStack. It’s embarrassing how bad docker is by comparison.

If your company is paying for docker desktop, stop right now and switch to OrbStack.

antihero1y ago

I'll give it a shot - how useful are the Pro features?

bdcravens1y ago

k8sToGo1y ago

Does it keep things contained?

Does it mess up or clutter the system?

Currently I am using a Fusion VM to have something similar to WSL2 on Mac. Is this a better solution?

PufPufPuf1y ago

I'm a fan of Rancher Desktop -- it has everything integrated and working out of the box, it can even provide the CLI tools like docker, kubectl or helm for you.

alyandon1y ago

The Rancher Desktop VM with k8s enabled has about 10% continuous cpu usage at idle on my 2019 MBP. I really wish there was something I could do to reduce that.

mdaniel1y ago

That is almost certainly the etcd binaries on the vm chatting to itself. I would expect k3s should have lower CPU usage as they (by default) jettison etcd for an embedded db

Having said that, aside from the general WTF of something burning CPU, does in impact you in some way? Battery drain, sluggish apps, memory hog (I'd bet on that one), other?

1 more reply

hedora1y ago

If you want something more general purpose, Canonical Multipass has a good sample docker setup. Annoyingly, This is the only Canonical product I can recommend at this point.

I use it with MacOS. I assume WSL is a better choice for Windows laptops, and there’s no reason to add a VM to get docker on Linux.

https://multipass.run/docs/docker-how-to

5kg1y ago

[1]: https://github.com/canonical/multipass/issues/3455 [2]: https://github.com/canonical/multipass/issues/3235 [3]: https://github.com/qemu/qemu/commits/master/accel/hvf

2 more replies

gbalduzzi1y ago

Has someone ever tried both Rancher Desktop and OrbStack on macOS?

I love OrbStack but I never heard of Rancher Desktop before, maybe I should try it

planewave1y ago

Yes! Maybe I’m always expecting the wrong thing with Podman Desktop, but I can’t ever get it to work the way I expect it to - on Windows or Mac.

Rancher Desktop, however, has been a breeze. Same with using Lima.[0]

With Lima:

  limactrl create template://docker

[0] https://lima-vm.io/

PufPufPuf1y ago

...and on Linux running the actual docker daemon, of course.

asmor1y ago

Initial experience on random (fresh-ish install) Windows laptop: Bad. Creates VM, and then can't find it. Now I can install Hyper-V management tools to get rid of it...

Error: Command execution failed with exit code 125 Command execution failed with exit code 125 Error: vm "podman-machine-default" already exists on hypervisor

ethanpil1y ago

With all of these great improvements in recent months i'd love to see an updated roadmap... https://github.com/containers/podman-desktop/wiki/Roadmap

yeldarb1y ago

Anyone know if there’s a way to get access to devices in a container on MacOS yet? (Eg USB webcam, MPS or CUDA accelerator)

geerlingguy1y ago

rhatdan1y ago

Look for krunkit for GPU/Cuda Accelerator. Should be much better support in podman 5.2 out next month, I believe.

You can use it now if you grab it from brew.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse