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this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2023
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I think the more intuitive model (to me) is instead of thinking of it as a lightweight virtual machine, or a neatly packaged up OS, is to instead think of it as a process shipped with an environment. That environment includes things like files and other executables (like apt), but in of itself doesn't constitute an OS. It doesn't have its own filesystems, drivers, or anything like that. By default it doesn't run an init system like systemd either, nor does it run any other applications other than the process you execute in the environment.
That's fair, but is that environment any different from just a virtual OS? I mean it doesn't have its own filesystem and drivers etc, but that's precisely because they've been made virtual.
In this context I'd say systemd is an application, not the OS, though the distinction gets iffy I know.
Because I associate an OS with more then just an environment. It often has several running apps for instance, often a GUI or shell (which many containers don't have), are concerned about some form of hardware (virtual or physical), and just... Do more.
Containers by contrast are just a view into your filesystem, and some isolation from the rest of the environment through concepts like cgroups. All the integrations with the container host are a lot simpler (and accurate) to think of as just simply removing layers of isolation, rather then thinking of it like its own VM or OS. Capabilities just fit the model a lot better.
I agree the line is iffy since many OS's leave out a few things of the above, like RTOS's for MCUs, but I just don't think it's worth thinking of a container like its own OS considering how different it is from a "normal" Linux based OS or VM.