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  1. Stackups
  2. Application & Data
  3. Container Registry
  4. Virtual Machine Platforms And Containers
  5. Docker vs Marathon

Docker vs Marathon

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

Docker
Docker
Stacks194.2K
Followers143.8K
Votes3.9K
Marathon
Marathon
Stacks84
Followers91
Votes5

Docker vs Marathon: What are the differences?

Introduction: This Markdown code provides a comparison between Docker and Marathon, highlighting key differences between the two popular technologies used in the field of container orchestration.

  1. Containerization Technology: Docker is primarily a containerization technology that enables developers to package their applications and dependencies into a container that can run on any machine. On the other hand, Marathon is a container orchestration platform that helps manage a cluster of containers, providing features such as scaling, load balancing, and monitoring.

  2. Primary Use Case: Docker is widely used for developing, deploying, and running applications in isolated environments, making it easier to ship and run applications consistently across different environments. Meanwhile, Marathon is specifically designed for deploying and managing containerized applications at scale in production environments, offering features for high availability and fault tolerance.

  3. Scope of Control: Docker focuses on the development and runtime environment of individual containers, allowing developers to define the configuration, dependencies, and execution environment of their applications. In contrast, Marathon operates at a higher level, managing the deployment, scaling, and coordination of multiple containers across a cluster of machines, providing a centralized control plane for microservices architecture.

  4. Architecture and Design: Docker follows a client-server architecture where the Docker engine interacts with the containers running on the host machine, while Marathon is based on a distributed system architecture that consists of multiple components like the Marathon scheduler, Mesos master, and Mesos agents to manage containerized applications across a cluster of machines.

  5. Scaling and Resource Management: Docker provides basic tools for scaling containers within a single host machine but lacks the advanced functionalities for orchestrating containers across multiple machines in a distributed environment. On the other hand, Marathon leverages the Mesos cluster manager to handle resource allocation, scheduling, and scaling of containers dynamically based on resource availability and workload requirements.

  6. Community and Ecosystem: Docker has a large and diverse community of developers, contributors, and third-party tools that support various use cases and integrations with other technologies, making it a popular choice for containerization. In comparison, Marathon is primarily used in conjunction with Mesos for large-scale container orchestration, benefiting from the tight integration with Mesos ecosystem tools and frameworks like Apache Spark and Hadoop.

In Summary, the key differences between Docker and Marathon lie in their primary focus on containerization and orchestration, scope of control, architecture, scaling capabilities, and community support, catering to different use cases in the container ecosystem.

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Advice on Docker, Marathon

Florian
Florian

IT DevOp at Agitos GmbH

Oct 22, 2019

Decided

lxd/lxc and Docker aren't congruent so this comparison needs a more detailed look; but in short I can say: the lxd-integrated administration of storage including zfs with its snapshot capabilities as well as the system container (multi-process) approach of lxc vs. the limited single-process container approach of Docker is the main reason I chose lxd over Docker.

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Detailed Comparison

Docker
Docker
Marathon
Marathon

The Docker Platform is the industry-leading container platform for continuous, high-velocity innovation, enabling organizations to seamlessly build and share any application — from legacy to what comes next — and securely run them anywhere

Marathon is an Apache Mesos framework for container orchestration. Marathon provides a REST API for starting, stopping, and scaling applications. Marathon is written in Scala and can run in highly-available mode by running multiple copies. The state of running tasks gets stored in the Mesos state abstraction.

Integrated developer tools; open, portable images; shareable, reusable apps; framework-aware builds; standardized templates; multi-environment support; remote registry management; simple setup for Docker and Kubernetes; certified Kubernetes; application templates; enterprise controls; secure software supply chain; industry-leading container runtime; image scanning; access controls; image signing; caching and mirroring; image lifecycle; policy-based image promotion
-
Statistics
Stacks
194.2K
Stacks
84
Followers
143.8K
Followers
91
Votes
3.9K
Votes
5
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 823
    Rapid integration and build up
  • 692
    Isolation
  • 521
    Open source
  • 505
    Testa­bil­i­ty and re­pro­ducibil­i­ty
  • 460
    Lightweight
Cons
  • 8
    New versions == broken features
  • 6
    Documentation not always in sync
  • 6
    Unreliable networking
  • 4
    Moves quickly
  • 3
    Not Secure
Pros
  • 1
    Service Discovery
  • 1
    Powerful UI
  • 1
    High Availability
  • 1
    Load Balancing
  • 1
    Health Checks
Integrations
Java
Java
Docker Compose
Docker Compose
VirtualBox
VirtualBox
Linux
Linux
Amazon EC2 Container Service
Amazon EC2 Container Service
Docker Swarm
Docker Swarm
boot2docker
boot2docker
Kubernetes
Kubernetes
Docker Machine
Docker Machine
Vagrant
Vagrant
Mesosphere
Mesosphere
Apache Mesos
Apache Mesos

What are some alternatives to Docker, Marathon?

Kubernetes

Kubernetes

Kubernetes is an open source orchestration system for Docker containers. It handles scheduling onto nodes in a compute cluster and actively manages workloads to ensure that their state matches the users declared intentions.

Rancher

Rancher

Rancher is an open source container management platform that includes full distributions of Kubernetes, Apache Mesos and Docker Swarm, and makes it simple to operate container clusters on any cloud or infrastructure platform.

Docker Compose

Docker Compose

With Compose, you define a multi-container application in a single file, then spin your application up in a single command which does everything that needs to be done to get it running.

Docker Swarm

Docker Swarm

Swarm serves the standard Docker API, so any tool which already communicates with a Docker daemon can use Swarm to transparently scale to multiple hosts: Dokku, Compose, Krane, Deis, DockerUI, Shipyard, Drone, Jenkins... and, of course, the Docker client itself.

Tutum

Tutum

Tutum lets developers easily manage and run lightweight, portable, self-sufficient containers from any application. AWS-like control, Heroku-like ease. The same container that a developer builds and tests on a laptop can run at scale in Tutum.

Portainer

Portainer

It is a universal container management tool. It works with Kubernetes, Docker, Docker Swarm and Azure ACI. It allows you to manage containers without needing to know platform-specific code.

LXD

LXD

LXD isn't a rewrite of LXC, in fact it's building on top of LXC to provide a new, better user experience. Under the hood, LXD uses LXC through liblxc and its Go binding to create and manage the containers. It's basically an alternative to LXC's tools and distribution template system with the added features that come from being controllable over the network.

Codefresh

Codefresh

Automate and parallelize testing. Codefresh allows teams to spin up on-demand compositions to run unit and integration tests as part of the continuous integration process. Jenkins integration allows more complex pipelines.

LXC

LXC

LXC is a userspace interface for the Linux kernel containment features. Through a powerful API and simple tools, it lets Linux users easily create and manage system or application containers.

CAST.AI

CAST.AI

It is an AI-driven cloud optimization platform for Kubernetes. Instantly cut your cloud bill, prevent downtime, and 10X the power of DevOps.

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