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While using Docker Compose, one error that you might encounter is: "Docker Compose Not Found". This error might seem daunting at first glance; however, it usually points to a few common issues that are relatively straightforward to resolve. In this blog post, we'll explore three common scenarios that trigger this error and provide fixes for each. Let's dive in! #1 Wrong Docker Compose Command Line SyntaxOne reason you might encounter the 'Docker Compose command not found' error is due to the use of incorrect Docker Compose command line syntax. In Docker Compose V1, the command line syntax is docker-compose, with a hyphen (-) between 'docker' and 'compose'. However, for Docker Compose V2, the syntax depends on the installation method. As a plugin: When installed as a plugin, Docker Compose V2 follows the docker compose syntax, where commands are issued with a space instead of a hyphen. For example, to check the version, you would use docker compose version.As a standalone binary: If Docker Compose V2 is installed as a standalone binary, the command syntax shifts to using a hyphen (docker-compose), similar to V1's approach. For instance, if I install Docker Compose V1 and then use the command docker compose version to check the installed version—note that I'm using the V2 syntax—I receive a message stating: “docker: 'compose' is not a docker command,” as shown below: Conversely, after installing the Docker Compose Plugin (V2) and using the V1 command line syntax to check the Docker Compose version, I see the error: “Command 'docker-compose' not found,” as shown below: Solution:The fix is straightforward—check the version using both command line syntaxes, and continue with the syntax that successfully returns the Docker Compose version. Note: Compose V1 stopped receiving updates in July 2023 and is no longer included in new Docker Desktop releases. Compose V2 has taken its place and is now integrated into all current Docker Desktop versions. For more details, review the migration guide to Compose V2. #2 Docker Compose Not InstalledAnother reason you might see the "Command Docker Compose Not Found" error is because you don’t have Docker Compose installed. On macOS, Windows, and Linux, when you install Docker Desktop, Docker Compose comes bundled with it, so you don’t need to install it separately. However, the situation can differ on Linux. You may have installed Docker Engine and Docker CLI but not Docker Compose. Note: Although recent versions of Docker Engine for Linux have started to include Docker Compose as part of the Docker package (especially with the introduction of the Docker Compose V2), this isn't universally the case for all Linux distributions or installation methods. For example, on my Ubuntu system, I have Docker Engine and Docker CLI installed but not Docker Compose. So, if I check the Docker Compose version using the command docker compose version (Docker Compose V2 syntax), I get an error saying “docker: ‘compose’ is not a docker command,” as shown below: If I check the version using the Docker Compose V1 syntax (docker-compose --version), I get the error: “Command ‘docker-compose’ not found,” as shown below: But how can we be sure that this error is because we don’t have Docker Compose installed and not for some other reason? Well, if we don’t find any result when searching for the Docker Compose binary, this means Docker Compose has not been installed. You can run the command below to search your entire filesystem for the docker-compose binary: sudo find / -name docker-compose After running the command, if you don’t get any results, then Docker Compose is not installed on your system. Solution:The solution is straightforward—Install Docker Compose. You can find installation instructions for your specific Linux distribution here. #3 Incorrect Path ConfigurationAnother common reason behind the "Command Docker Compose Not Found" error could be an incorrect PATH configuration. The PATH environment variable helps your operating system locate executables. If Docker Compose is installed in a non-standard location but not properly added to your PATH, your terminal won't be able to find and execute Docker Compose commands. SolutionFirst, locate the installation directory of Docker Compose on your system using the following command: sudo find / -name docker-compose Once identified, add this directory to your system's PATH environment variable. This ensures that your system can recognize and execute Docker Compose commands from any directory. Note: Make sure that the path you add to the PATH variable points to the directory containing the docker-compose binary, not to the file itself. For example, if the full path to the docker-compose binary is /usr/local/bin/docker-compose, you should add /usr/local/bin to your PATH, not /usr/local/bin/docker-compose. ConclusionIn this blog post, we walked through three common causes behind the "Docker Compose Not Found" error and detailed the steps to resolve each. Now, you're equipped with the knowledge to troubleshoot this issue, whether it arises from incorrect Docker Compose command line syntax, missing Docker Compose installation, or incorrect PATH configuration. Want to learn how to view logs for a multi-container application deployed via Docker Compose, so that you can troubleshoot when applications don’t run as expected? Check out our blog post: Docker-Compose Logs: How to View Log Output? Interested in learning more about Docker? Check out the following courses from KodeKloud: Docker for the Absolute Beginner: This course will help you understand Docker using lectures and demos. You’ll get a hands-on learning experience and coding exercises that will validate your Docker skills. Additionally, assignments will challenge you to apply your skills in real-life scenarios.Docker Certified Associate Exam Course: This course includes all the topics covered by the Docker Certified Associate Exam curriculum. The course offers several opportunities for practice and self-assessment. There are hundreds of research questions in multiple-choice format, practice tests at the end of each section, and multiple mock exams that closely resemble the actual exam pattern.View the full article

Docker Compose‘s simplicity — just run compose up — has been an integral part of developer workflows for a decade, with the first commit occurring in 2013, back when it was called Plum. Although the feature set has grown dramatically in that time, maintaining that experience has always been integral to the spirit of Compose. In this post, we’ll walk through how to manage microservice sprawl with Docker Compose by importing subprojects from other Git repos. Maintaining simplicity Now, perhaps more than ever, that simplicity is key. The complexity of modern software development is undeniable regardless of whether you’re using microservices or a monolith, deploying to the cloud or on-prem, or writing in JavaScript or C. Compose has not kept up with this “development sprawl” and is even sometimes an obstacle when working on larger, more complex projects. Maintaining Compose to accurately represent your increasingly complex application can require its own expertise, often resulting in out-of-date configuration in YAML or complex makefile tasks. As an open source project, Compose serves everyone from home lab enthusiasts to transcontinental corporations, which is no small feat, and our commitment to maintaining Compose’s signature simplicity for all users hasn’t changed. The increased flexibility afforded by Compose watch and include means your project no longer needs to be one-size-fits-all. Now, it’s possible to split your project across Git repos and import services as needed, customizing their configuration in the process. Application architecture Let’s take a look at a hypothetical application architecture. To begin, the application is split across two Git repos: backend — Backend in Python/Flask frontend — Single-page app (SPA) frontend in JavaScript/Node.js While working on the frontend, the developers run without using Docker or Compose, launching npm start on their laptops directly and proxy API requests to a shared staging server (as opposed to running the backend locally). Meanwhile, while working on the backend, developers and CI (for integration tests) share a Compose file and rely on command-line tools like cURL to manually test functionality locally. We’d like a flexible configuration that enables each group of developers to use their optimal workflow (e.g., leveraging hot reload for the frontend) while also allowing reuse to share project configuration between repos. At first, this seems like an impossible situation to resolve. Frontend We can start by adding a compose.yaml file to frontend: services: frontend: pull_policy: build build: context: . environment: BACKEND_HOST: ${BACKEND_HOST:-https://staging.example.com} ports: - 8000:8000 Note: If you’re wondering what the Dockerfile looks like, take a look at this samples page for an up-to-date example of best practices generated by docker init. This is a great start! Running docker compose up will now build the Node.js frontend and make it accessible at http://localhost:8000/. The BACKEND_HOST environment variable can be used to control where upstream API requests are proxied to and defaults to our shared staging instance. Unfortunately, we’ve lost the great developer experience afforded by hot module reload (HMR) because everything is inside the container. By adding a develop.watch section, we can preserve that: services: frontend: pull_policy: build build: context: . environment: BACKEND_HOST: ${BACKEND_HOST:-https://staging.example.com} ports: - 8000:8000 develop: watch: - path: package.json action: rebuild - path: src/ target: /app/src action: sync Now, while working on the frontend, developers continue to benefit from the rapid iteration cycles due to HMR. Whenever a file is modified locally in the src/ directory, it’s synchronized into the container at /app/src. If the package.json file is modified, the entire container is rebuilt, so that the RUN npm install step in the Dockerfile will be re-executed and install the latest dependencies. The best part is the only change to the workflow is running docker compose watch instead of npm start. Backend Now, let’s set up a Compose file in backend: services: backend: pull_policy: build build: context: . ports: - 1234:8080 develop: watch: - path: requirements.txt action: rebuild - path: ./ target: /app/ action: sync include: - path: git@github.com:myorg/frontend.git env_file: frontend.env frontend.env BACKEND_HOST=http://backend:8080 Much of this looks very similar to the frontend compose.yaml. When files in the project directory change locally, they’re synchronized to /app inside the container, so the Flask dev server can handle hot reload. If the requirements.txt is changed, the entire container is rebuilt, so that the RUN pip install step in the Dockerfile will be re-executed and install the latest dependencies. However, we’ve also added an include section that references the frontend project by its Git repository. The custom env_file points to a local path (in the backend repo), which sets BACKEND_HOST so that the frontend service container will proxy API requests to the backend service container instead of the default. Note: Remote includes are an experimental feature. You’ll need to set COMPOSE_EXPERIMENTAL_GIT_REMOTE=1 in your environment to use Git references. With this configuration, developers can now run the full stack while keeping the frontend and backend Compose projects independent and even in different Git repositories. As developers, we’re used to sharing code library dependencies, and the include keyword brings this same reusability and convenience to your Compose development configurations. What’s next? There are still some rough edges. For example, the remote project is cloned to a temporary directory, which makes it impractical to use with watch mode when imported, as the files are not available for editing. Enabling bigger and more complex software projects to use Compose for flexible, personal environments is something we’re continuing to improve upon. If you’re a Docker customer using Compose across microservices or repositories, we’d love to hear how we can better support you. Get in touch! Learn more Get the latest release of Docker Desktop. Vote on what’s next! Check out our public roadmap. Have questions? The Docker community is here to help. New to Docker? Get started. View the full article

Docker Compose Watch, a tool to improve the inner loop of application development, is now generally available. Hot reload is one of those engineering workflow features that’s seemingly minor and simple but has cumulative benefits. If you can trust your app will update seamlessly as you code, without losing state, it’s one less thing pulling your focus from the work at hand. You can see your frontend components come to life while you stay in your IDE. With containerized application development, there are more steps than Alt+Tab and hitting reload in your browser. Even with caching, rebuilding the image and re-creating the container — especially after waiting on stop and start time — can disrupt focus. We built Docker Compose Watch to smooth away these workflow papercuts. We have learned from many people using our open source Docker Compose project for local development. Now we are natively addressing common workflow friction we observe, like the use case of hot reload for frontend development... View the full article

Docker compose is a core component of Docker that is frequently utilized to configure the application executed on multiple containers. Docker-compose is mostly utilized to configure the services of containers in the “YAML” file. Different keys are used in the service configuration, “expose” and “ports” are specifically utilized to specify the exposing port for containers. This write-up will explain the difference between the ports and expose key in Docker compose. Difference Between Expose and Ports in Docker Compose The “expose” and “ports” keys in Docker compose are utilized to configure the network and the exposing ports for the container. However, both keys are used for the same purpose, but the key difference between the “ports” and “expose” is that the expose key is accessible to the services that are connected to the same network but not on the host. In contrast, ports are accessible and published on the host as well as on the connected network. Checking the Difference Between “expose” and “ports” Keys in Docker-compose Practically To check the difference between expose and ports key practically, go through the listed examples: Utilize “ports” Key in Docker-Compose File Utilize “expose” Key in Docker-Compose File Example 1: Utilize “ports” Key in Docker-Compose File The “ports” key is utilized to publish the container on the host machine. These containers are accessible to all services that are executing on the host as well on a connected network. To use the “ports” key in Docker compose, check out the given instructions. Step 1: Create a “docker-compose.yml” Make a “docker-compose.yml” file and paste the below code block into the file: version: "3" services: web: image: nginx:latest ports: - 8080:80 According to the above snippet: “web” service is configured in the “docker-compose.yml” file. “image” defines the base image for the compose container “ports” specify the exposing port of the container on a network and host: Step 2: Start Containers Next, create and fire up the compose container with the help of “docker-compose up” command: > docker-compose up -d Step 3: List Compose Container List the container and verify the exposing port of the container. From the output, it can observe that we have published the container on the host: > docker-compose ps Example 2: Utilize “expose” Key in Docker-Compose File To utilize the expose key in the “docker-compose.yml” file, take a look at provided instructions. Step 1: Create a “docker-compose.yml” Now, configure the “web” service on exposing port 80 with the help of the “expose” key. Here, we have not defined any network for the container: version: "3" services: web: image: nginx:latest expose: - 8080:80 Step 2: Fire up the Container Next, create and start the compose container to run web service using the provided command: > docker-compose up -d Step 3: List Compose Container List the compose container and check the exposing port of the container. From the below output, you can observe that the container is accessible only on port 80 on a default selected network but not on host: > docker-compose ps We have defined the distinction of “expose” and “ports” keys in Docker compose. Conclusion The “expose” and “ports” are both used to specify the exposing port of the container to run defined services. The major difference between these two keys is that “ports” is published and accessible on the host machine and also on the specified network, while “expose” is only published on the defined network and accessed by services that are running on the same network. This write-up demonstrated the distinction between “ports” and “expose” in Docker compose. View the full article

By using cloud platforms, we can take advantage of different resource configurations and compute capacities. However, deploying containerized applications on cloud platforms is proving to be quite challenging, especially for new users who have no expertise on how to use that platform. As each platform may provide specific APIs, orchestrating the deployment of a containerized application can become a hassle. Docker Compose is a very popular tool used to manage containerized applications deployed on Docker hosts. Its popularity is maybe due to the simplicity on how to define an application and its components in a Compose file and the compact commands to manage its deployment. Since cloud platforms for containers have emerged, being able to deploy a Compose application on them is a most-wanted feature by many developers that use Docker Compose for their local development. In this blog post, we discuss how to use Docker Compose to deploy containerized applications to Amazon ECS. We aim to show how the transition from deploying to a local Docker environment to deploying to Amazon ECS is effortless, the application being managed in the same way for both environments. Requirements In order to exercise the examples in this blogpost, the following tools need to be installed locally: Windows and MacOS: install Docker Desktop Linux: install Docker Engine and Compose CLI To deploy to Amazon ECS: an AWS account For deploying a Compose file to Amazon ECS, we rely on the new Docker Compose implementation embedded into the Docker CLI binary. Therefore, we are going to run docker compose commands instead of docker-compose. For local deployments, both implementations of Docker Compose should work. If you find a missing feature that you use, report it on the issue tracker. Throughout this blogpost, we discuss how to: Build and ship a Compose Application. We exercise how to run an application defined in a Compose file locally and how to build and ship its images to Docker Hub to make them accessible from anywhere. Create an ECS context to target Amazon ECS. Run the Compose application on Amazon ECS. Build and Ship a Compose application Let us take an example application with the following structure: $ tree myproject/ myproject/ ├── backend │ ├── Dockerfile │ ├── main.py │ └── requirements.txt ├── compose.yaml └── frontend ├── Dockerfile └── nginx.conf 2 directories, 6 files The content of the files can be found here. The Compose file define only 2 services as follows: $ cat compose.yaml services: frontend: build: frontend ports: - 80:80 depends_on: - backend backend: build: backend Deploying this file locally on a Docker engine is quite straightforward: $ docker compose up -d [+] Running 3/3 ⠿ Network "myproject_default" Created 0.5s ⠿ Container myproject_backend_1 Started 0.7s ⠿ Container myproject_frontend_1 Started 1.4s Check the application is running locally: $ docker ps CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES eec2dd88fd67 myproject_frontend "/docker-entrypoint...." 4 seconds ago Up 3 seconds 0.0.0.0:80->80/tcp myproject_frontend_1 2c64e62b933b myproject_backend "python3 /app/main.py" 4 seconds ago Up 3 seconds myproject_backend_1 Query the frontend: $ curl localhost:80 ## . ## ## ## == ## ## ## ## ## === /"""""""""""""""""\___/ === { / ===- \______ O __/ \ \ __/ \____\_______/ Hello from Docker! To remove the application: $ docker compose down [+] Running 3/3 ⠿ Container myproject_frontend_1 Removed 0.5s ⠿ Container myproject_backend_1 Removed 10.3s ⠿ Network "myproject_default" Removed 0.4s In order to deploy this application on ECS, we need to have the images for the application frontend and backend stored in a public image registry such as Docker Hub. This enables the images to be pulled from anywhere. To upload the images to Docker Hub, we can set the image names in the compose file as follows: $ cat compose.yamlservices: frontend: image: myhubuser/starter-front build: frontend ports: - 80:80 depends_on: - backend backend: image: myhubuser/starter-back build: backend Build the images with Docker Compose: $ docker compose build [+] Building 1.2s (16/16) FINISHED => [myhubuser/starter-front internal] load build definition from Dockerfile 0.0s => => transferring dockerfile: 31B 0.0s => [myhubuser/starter-back internal] load build definition from Dockerfile 0.0s ... In the build output we can notice the image has been named and tagged according to the image field from the Compose file. Before pushing the images to Docker Hub, check to be logged in: $ docker login ... Login Succeeded Push the images: $ docker compose push [+] Running 0/16 ⠧ Pushing Pushing frontend: f009a503aca1 Pushing [===========================================... 2.7s ... The images should be stored now in Docker Hub. Create an ECS Docker Context To make Docker Compose target the Amazon ECS platform, we need first to create a Docker context of the ECS type. A docker context is a mechanism that allows redirecting commands to different Docker hosts or cloud platforms. We assume at this point that we have AWS credentials set up in the local environment for authenticating with the ECS platform. To create an ECS context run the following command: $ docker context create ecs myecscontext ? Create a Docker context using: [Use arrows to move, type to filter] An existing AWS profile AWS secret and token credentials > AWS environment variables Based on the familiarity with the AWS credentials setup and the AWS tools use, we are prompted to choose between 3 context setups. To skip the details of AWS credential setup, we choose the option of using environment variables. $ docker context create ecs myecscontext ? Create a Docker context using: AWS environment variables Successfully created ecs context "myecscontext" This requires to have the AWS_ACCESS_KEY and AWS_SECRET_KEY set in the local environment when running Docker commands that target Amazon ECS. The current context in use is marked by * in the output of context listing: $ docker context lsNAME TYPE DESCRIPTION DOCKER ENDPOINT default * moby Current DOCKER_HOST based configuration unix:///var/run/docker.sockmyecscontext ecs credentials read from environment To make all subsequent commands target Amazon ECS, make the newly created ECS context the one in use by running: $ docker context use myecscontext myecscontext $ docker context ls NAME TYPE DESCRIPTION DOCKER ENDPOINT default moby Current DOCKER_HOST based configuration unix:///var/run/docker.sock myecscontext * ecs credentials read from environment Run the Compose application on Amazon ECS An alternative to having it as the context in use is to set the context flag for all commands targeting ECS. WARNING: Check in advance the cost that the ECS deployment may incur for 2 ECS services, load balancing (ALB), cloud map (DNS resolution) etc. For the following commands, we keep ECS context as the current context in use. Before running commands on ECS, make sure the Amazon account credentials grant access to manage resources for the application as detailed in the documentation. We can now run a command to check we can successfully access ECS. $ AWS_ACCESS_KEY="*****" AWS_SECRET_KEY="******" docker compose ls NAME STATUS Export the AWS credentials to avoid setting them for every command. $ export AWS_ACCESS_KEY="*****" $ export AWS_SECRET_KEY="******" The deploy the sample application to ECS, we can run the same command as in the local deployment: $ docker compose up WARNING services.build: unsupported attribute WARNING services.build: unsupported attribute [+] Running 18/18 ⠿ myproject CreateComplete 206.0s ⠿ FrontendTCP80TargetGroup CreateComplete 0.0s ⠿ CloudMap CreateComplete 46.0s ⠿ FrontendTaskExecutionRole CreateComplete 19.0s ⠿ Cluster CreateComplete 5.0s ⠿ DefaultNetwork CreateComplete 5.0s ⠿ BackendTaskExecutionRole CreateComplete 19.0s ⠿ LogGroup CreateComplete 1.0s ⠿ LoadBalancer CreateComplete 122.0s ⠿ Default80Ingress CreateComplete 1.0s ⠿ DefaultNetworkIngress CreateComplete 0.0s ⠿ BackendTaskDefinition CreateComplete 2.0s ⠿ FrontendTaskDefinition CreateComplete 3.0s ⠿ FrontendServiceDiscoveryEntry CreateComplete 1.0s ⠿ BackendServiceDiscoveryEntry CreateComplete 2.0s ⠿ BackendService CreateComplete 65.0s ⠿ FrontendTCP80Listener CreateComplete 3.0s ⠿ FrontendService CreateComplete 66.0s Docker Compose converts the Compose file to a CloudFormation template defining a set of AWS resources. Details on the resource mapping can be found in the documentation. To review the CloudFormation template generated, we can run the command: $ docker compose convert WARNING services.build: unsupported attribute WARNING services.build: unsupported attribute AWSTemplateFormatVersion: 2010-09-09 Resources: BackendService: Properties: Cluster: Fn::GetAtt: - Cluster - Arn DeploymentConfiguration: MaximumPercent: 200 MinimumHealthyPercent: 100... To check the state of the services, we can run the command: $ docker compose ps NAME SERVICE STATUS PORTS task/myproject/8c142dea1282499c83050b4d3e689566 backend Running task/myproject/a608f6df616e4345b92a3d596991652d frontend Running mypro-LoadB-1ROWIHLNOG5RZ-1172432386.eu-west-3.elb.amazonaws.com:80->80/http Similarly to the local run, we can query the frontend of the application: $ curl mypro-LoadB-1ROWIHLNOG5RZ-1172432386.eu-west-3.elb.amazonaws.com:80 ## . ## ## ## == ## ## ## ## ## === /"""""""""""""""""\___/ === { / ===- \______ O __/ \ \ __/ \____\_______/ Hello from Docker! We can retrieve logs from the ECS containers by running the compose logs command: $ docker compose logs backend | * Serving Flask app "main" (lazy loading) backend | * Environment: production backend | WARNING: This is a development server. Do not use it in a production deployment. backend | Use a production WSGI server instead. ... frontend | /docker-entrypoint.sh: Launching /docker-entrypoint.d/20-envsubst-on-templates.sh frontend | /docker-entrypoint.sh: Launching /docker-entrypoint.d/30-tune-worker-processes.sh frontend | /docker-entrypoint.sh: Configuration complete; ready for start up frontend | 172.31.22.98 - - [02/Mar/2021:08:35:27 +0000] "GET / HTTP/1.1" 200 212 "-" "ELB-HealthChecker/2.0" "-" backend | 172.31.0.11 - - [02/Mar/2021 08:35:27] "GET / HTTP/1.0" 200 - backend | 172.31.0.11 - - [02/Mar/2021 08:35:57] "GET / HTTP/1.0" 200 - frontend | 172.31.22.98 - - [02/Mar/2021:08:35:57 +0000] "GET / HTTP/1.1" 200 212 "-" "curl/7.75.0" "94.239.119.152" frontend | 172.31.22.98 - - [02/Mar/2021:08:35:57 +0000] "GET / HTTP/1.1" 200 212 "-" "ELB-HealthChecker/2.0" "-" To terminate the Compose application and release AWS resources, run: $ docker compose down [+] Running 2/4 ⠴ myproject DeleteInProgress User Initiated 8.5s ⠿ DefaultNetworkIngress DeleteComplete 1.0s ⠿ Default80Ingress DeleteComplete 1.0s ⠴ FrontendService DeleteInProgress 7.5s... The Docker documentation provides several examples of Compose files, supported features, details on how to deploy and how to update a Compose application running in ECS, etc. The following features are discussed in detail: use of private images service discovery volumes and secrets definition AWS-specific service properties for auto-scaling, IAM roles and load balancing use of existing AWS resources Summary We have covered the transition from local deployment of a Compose application to the deployment on Amazon ECS. We have used a minimal generic example for demonstrating how to use the Docker Compose cloud-capability. For a better understanding on how to update the Compose file and use specific AWS features, the documentation provides much more details. Resources: Docker Compose embedded in the Docker CLIhttps://github.com/docker/compose-cli/blob/main/INSTALL.md Compose to ECS support https://docs.docker.com/cloud/ecs-integration/ ECS-specific Compose examples:https://docs.docker.com/cloud/ecs-compose-examples/ Deploying Docker containers to ECS:https://docs.docker.com/cloud/ecs-integration/ Sample used to demonstrate Compose commands:https://github.com/aiordache/demos/tree/master/ecsblog-demo The post Docker Compose: From Local to Amazon ECS appeared first on Docker Blog. View the full article