Is it able to use Internet Explorer with Docker?

Question

I am a web application programmer and I have to build a test environment for IE 9 (test for compatibility).

My host machine is macOS Mojave, so I have to use some platform which is able to install and run IE. A Virtual Machine is one of the options, but I think it is a little bit heavy for test purpose.

Therefore I am considering use Docker, so I have searched Docker Hub, but do not get what container should I use. (And is it possible in the first place? CentOS and Ubuntu is available, but Windows?)

In conclusion, I would like to know how could I use Docker with minimal Windows, or is there more light ways on macOS to use IE than using a Virtual Machine?

Solution

A container uses the kernel of its host - so you can run linux docker containers on linux, windows docker containers on windows (and linux on windows is a bit odd since they can implement a subset of the linux kernel through linuxkit) and so on.

You can't run a windows docker container on linux or OS X however because there's no linuxkit equivilent.

Unless there's a IE port for OS X (and there hasn't been since the OS 9 days) your options for running IE all involve a full install of windows running on a VM

MS does have a few free 'trial' VMs that run for 30 days specifically for testing, so you wouldn't need a licence

Comments

[Ramhound]

You cannot run Windows within a docker container. Just use one of the free VMs and use VirtualBox.

[Ramhound]

If you don't want to use a Virtual Machine, your only other choice, is to use BootCamp and/or booting directly to Windows.

[Jeff Adamson]

technically there was IE 5 for Mac OS X 10.0 until approx 10.3.