What’s in a name? Docker’s default container names
insane_heisenberg, stoic_darwin, condescending_hawking: where do these come from?
Setting SMART goals at the beginning of every week is a productivity technique that I picked up during my 12-week coding bootcamp with Makers. As part of this routine, I’d ask myself two questions every day:
- Am I having fun?
- Am I a better developer than I was yesterday?
The latter is still a work in progress, but thankfully, I can say I answer “Yes!” to the former quite frequently, and it just so happens that today was one of those times— which brings me to Docker.
What is Docker? 🐳
Docker is an open-source platform that enables containerisation, which, according to IBM, can be described as such:
…it involves packaging up software code and all its dependencies so that it can run uniformly and consistently on any infrastructure.
These packages are called “containers”, and unless you give them a custom name at creation, Docker provides a default name for you. But not just any name — take a look:
clever_carver, vigorous_dhawan, goofy_franklin…huh? If you’re like me, you’ll be, at best, thoroughly amused by this, and at worst, flooded by a wave of curiosity that will drive you to research about Docker container names and to write a post like this one.
Docker’s name generator
It only took me a couple of DuckDuckGo searches to find the GitHub repository where the code for Docker’s name generator lives, and it did not disappoint. Here’s the function (written in Go) that does the thing:
Now, none of this would’ve been fun if I hadn’t spent an unreasonable amount of time creating a name generator of my own. Inspired by this post and equipped with my newly-acquired skills in Ruby (and a love for cool-looking buttons), here’s my Docker-like name generation app:
✨ docker-name-generator.herokuapp.com ✨
Have fun randomising!
