Run BigchainDB with Docker On Mac

NOT for Production Use

Those developing on Mac can follow this document to run BigchainDB in docker containers for a quick dev setup. Running BigchainDB on Mac (Docker or otherwise) is not officially supported.

Support is very much limited as there are certain things that work differently in Docker for Mac than Docker for other platforms. Also, we do not use mac for our development and testing. :)

This page may not be up to date with various settings and docker updates at all the times.

These steps work as of this writing (2017.Mar.09) and might break in the future with updates to Docker for mac. Community contribution to make BigchainDB run on Docker for Mac will always be welcome.

Prerequisite

Install Docker for Mac.

(Optional) For a clean start

1. Stop all BigchainDB and RethinkDB/MongoDB containers.
2. Delete all BigchainDB docker images.
3. Delete the ~/bigchaindb_docker folder.

Pull the images

Pull the bigchaindb and other required docker images from docker hub.

docker pull bigchaindb/bigchaindb:master
docker pull [rethinkdb:2.3|mongo:3.4.1]

Create the BigchainDB configuration file on Mac

docker run \
  --rm \
  --volume $HOME/bigchaindb_docker:/data \
  bigchaindb/bigchaindb:master \
  -y configure \
  [mongodb|rethinkdb]

To ensure that BigchainDB connects to the backend database bound to the virtual interface 172.17.0.1, you must edit the BigchainDB configuration file (~/bigchaindb_docker/.bigchaindb) and change database.host from localhost to 172.17.0.1.

Run the backend database on Mac

From v0.9 onwards, you can run RethinkDB or MongoDB.

We use the virtual interface created by the Docker daemon to allow communication between the BigchainDB and database containers. It has an IP address of 172.17.0.1 by default.

You can also use docker host networking or bind to your primary (eth) interface, if needed.

For RethinkDB backend

docker run \
  --name=rethinkdb \
  --publish=28015:28015 \
  --publish=8080:8080 \
  --restart=always \
  --volume $HOME/bigchaindb_docker:/data \
  rethinkdb:2.3

For MongoDB backend

docker run \
  --name=mongodb \
  --publish=27017:27017 \
  --restart=always \
  --volume=$HOME/bigchaindb_docker/db:/data/db \
  --volume=$HOME/bigchaindb_docker/configdb:/data/configdb \
  mongo:3.4.1 --replSet=bigchain-rs

Run BigchainDB on Mac

docker run \
  --name=bigchaindb \
  --publish=9984:9984 \
  --restart=always \
  --volume=$HOME/bigchaindb_docker:/data \
  bigchaindb/bigchaindb \
  start