> My confidence is based on the momentum of Docker and Docker hosting services (orchardup, tutum, stackdock)
Orchardup was acquihired because of an open source tool they hacked and they are discontinuing their hosting service.
Tutum has no SLA at all and explicitly recommends only using their service for toy products. Basically, they're not a real hosting provider right now, just a very expensive toy.
Stackdock has been "currently upgrading our platform and sign-up has been temporarily disabled" for months now. I'm wondering what's going on, but I wouldn't be surprised if blocking new signups for such a long time means they're about to pull the plug, for whatever weird reason. So long without new customers (while I'm sure some are leaving) can't be healthy. I really want to give them money but I can't.
Finally, the people who made Docker itself once ran a PaaS service, dotCloud. It has been sold off and does not seem to be getting much new investment - definitely not any support for directly hosting Docker containers.
In short, there are currently 0 real Docker container hosting providers (and by 'real' I mean that they will exist past October and have at least some uptime guarantees).
I really want you to be right, but currently the evidence looks very bleak IMO.
We made this same bet last January and we're currently spending way too much effort DIY'ing it all on a VPS.
I wouldn't say it's bleak. The next version of Red Hat's PaaS is based on docker containers.
"The OpenShift v3 Cartridge format will adopt the Docker packaging model and enable users to leverage any application component packaged as a Docker image. This will enable developers to tap into the Docker Hub community to both access and share container images to use in OpenShift."
However, Orchardup was acquihired by Docker itself and I am sure they are planning to provide container hosting.
Tutum has just raised about $2M and are in the process of going gold with their service.
Yeah, stackdock is MIA.
However, the main point is that Docker is quite young and already has a developed ecosystem. Also all of these are specialized docker container providers, while I have no problems deploying a container on most VPS providers, IaaS platforms or even bare metal.
The Docker ecosystem is just starting to develop, Docker PaaS platforms are still in beta and while there is a lot of uncertainty, the vitals of the ecosystem look good. I may be wrong, but I am taking the plunge and my efforts will contribute a small part to the Docker ecosystem.
We have no interest in providing container hosting. We acquired Orchard for the great people doing amazing things in the ecosystem so they could continue their work on Fig in the context of Docker.
AWS Beanstalk for docker does work, but has some weaker points of relative comparison:
* inefficient - 1 docker image per AWS instance, which is expensive to run scaled up compared to running many containers per host
* slow - requires starting a VM which typically takes several minutes
* feature-bare - compared with PaaS platforms like heroku, cloud foundry, openshift, etc. for example, both heroku and cloud foundry have built-in aggregated logging and health management.
there is going to be a large spectrum of ways to run docker images, and you'll be able to choose bare bones to full-service.
here is a 4min video of cloud foundry next generation runtime diego showing spinning up 300 docker images in under a minute, providing load balancing, health management and aggregated logging: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e76a50ZgzxM
Orchardup was acquihired because of an open source tool they hacked and they are discontinuing their hosting service.
Tutum has no SLA at all and explicitly recommends only using their service for toy products. Basically, they're not a real hosting provider right now, just a very expensive toy.
Stackdock has been "currently upgrading our platform and sign-up has been temporarily disabled" for months now. I'm wondering what's going on, but I wouldn't be surprised if blocking new signups for such a long time means they're about to pull the plug, for whatever weird reason. So long without new customers (while I'm sure some are leaving) can't be healthy. I really want to give them money but I can't.
Finally, the people who made Docker itself once ran a PaaS service, dotCloud. It has been sold off and does not seem to be getting much new investment - definitely not any support for directly hosting Docker containers.
In short, there are currently 0 real Docker container hosting providers (and by 'real' I mean that they will exist past October and have at least some uptime guarantees).
I really want you to be right, but currently the evidence looks very bleak IMO.
We made this same bet last January and we're currently spending way too much effort DIY'ing it all on a VPS.