In this article we will learn how deploy an ASP.NET core web application in a docker Linux container. Docker is the platform for deploying and building the applications which delivers the application in the packages over the operating system level virtualization. Now lets start step by step to make it understandable to everyone by explaining it in a simple language.
Step 1: Install Prerequisites
You need to install the docker desktop client based on your machine (PC) as per your operating system type. Use the following link to download the docker desktop client.
The docker desktop client features are different based on the operating system and the docker subscription plan. The installed docker desktop client looks like as follows.
Step 2 : Create the ASP.NET Core Application
- Open Visual Studio (I am using 2019)
- Once Visual studio open then click on Continue Without Code(If you are using VS 2019)
- Then from Visual Studio Menu, click on File => New Project , as shown in the following image
After clicking on the New Project, the following window will appear, choose the project template ASP.NET Core Web App as shown in the following image.
After choosing the project template, click on the next button, provide the project name and storage location of the project on your PC.
After providing the required details, click on the next button, the following screen will get appeared. Provide additional information for your project such as target framework and other details. Just choose the latest .NET 5.0 and skip other details.
Now providing the required details, click the create button. It will create the ASP.NET Core web application and the created ASP.NET Core web application looks like as follows in your visual studio.
Step 3: Add Docker Support
Docker support can be enabled in two ways from visual studio, at the time of creating the application and after creating the application. To make it easier to make understand for beginners, in this tutorial we will enable the docker support after creating the ASP.NET core application.
Right click on the solution explorer of your existing project and follow the steps which are shown in the following image.
Once you click on the Docker Support option, it will prompt the screen which is shown in the step 4.
Step 4: Choose the Container (Docker File)
Choose the target operating system on which type of container you want to run the application, and it will create the docker image. Let's choose the Linux option which creates the image size smaller than compared to the windows container image.
In the preceding image click on the OK button, it will create the Docker file in your project solution as shown in the following image.
Step 5: Open the Docker File
Double click on docker file in which you will see auto generated code from visual studio which has pre-configured steps to create and run the docker image in multiple stages.
The visual studio creates docker file in your project which has multi-stages build features which make sure the final image remain smaller in the size which helps to become container more efficient and faster. The container images created in the following stages
- Base
- Build
- Publish
- Final Image
We will learn more about the base image and docker file stages in a separate article.
Step 6: Run the image in Docker Container
Choose the docker option to run the application as shown in the following image.
After clicking on the docker option, it will build the code and creates a docker image as well as a docker container and run the application inside the docker container. The application opens in the browser as follows.
In the preceding, our application is running inside the Linux Docker container instead of IIS express. We can view the created images by using the docker command or navigating to the docker desktop dashboard. Let's view images using the docker command. Open your windows command prompt and use the following command on the command prompt and press enter.
Docker Images
The preceding docker command will display the list of available docker images as follows.
I hope from all the above-mentioned examples you have learned how to deploy an ASP.NET Core web application in the docker Linux container.
Note
This tutorial is for the beginner, so there is no command line tool used to build, run the docker container images. This process internally after clicking on Visual Studio Run Option by choosing the Docker option does the same thing.
Summary
I hope the preceding article is useful to understand how to deploy an ASP.NET core web application on a docker Linux container.
1 comments:
The best post! Thanks a lot for the simplicity. It works awesome.
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