Hi! Im new to self hosting. Currently i am running a Jellyfin server on an old laptop. I am very curious to host other things in the future like immich or other services. I see a lot of mention of a program called docker.
search this on The internet I am still Not very clear what it does.
Could someone explain this to me like im stupid? What does it do and why would I need it?
Also what are other services that might be interesting to self host in The future?
Many thanks!
EDIT: Wow! thanks for all the detailed and super quick replies! I’ve been reading all the comments here and am concluding that (even though I am currently running only one service) it might be interesting to start using Docker to run all (future) services seperately on the server!
It can be, yes. One of the largest complaints with Docker is that you often end up running the same dependencies a dozen times, because each of your dozen containers uses them. But the trade-off is that you can run a dozen different versions of those dependencies, because each image shipped with the specific version they needed.
Of course, the big issue with running a dozen different versions of dependencies is that it makes security a nightmare. You’re not just tracking exploits for the most recent version of what you have installed. Many images end up shipping with out-of-date dependencies, which can absolutely be a security risk under certain circumstances. In most cases the risk is mitigated by the fact that the services are isolated and don’t really interact with the rest of the computer. But it’s at least something to keep in mind.