Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Docker VS Knative

Compare Docker VS Knative and see what are their differences

Docker logo Docker

Docker is an open platform that enables developers and system administrators to create distributed applications.

Knative logo Knative

Knative provides a set of components for building modern, source-centric, and container-based applications that can run anywhere.
  • Docker Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-07-25
  • Knative Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-08-27

Docker

Website
docker.com
$ Details
Release Date
2013 January
Startup details
Country
United States
State
California
Founder(s)
Solomon Hykes
Employees
50 - 99

Knative

Pricing URL
-
$ Details
-
Release Date
-

Docker features and specs

  • Portability
    Docker containers are designed to run consistently across different environments such as development, testing, and production, ensuring that software behaves the same regardless of where it's deployed.
  • Efficiency
    Docker containers share the host OS kernel and use fewer resources compared to traditional virtual machines, which allows for faster startups and reduced overhead.
  • Isolation
    Containers encapsulate the application and its dependencies in a separate environment, which minimizes conflicts between different applications' dependencies.
  • Scalability
    Docker makes it easier to scale applications quickly and manage resource allocation dynamically, which is particularly useful for microservices architectures.
  • Continuous Integration and Deployment
    Docker facilitates CI/CD processes by making it easier to automate the deployment pipeline, resulting in faster code releases and more frequent updates.
  • Community and Ecosystem
    A vast community and a rich ecosystem of tools and pre-built images in Docker Hub, enabling you to quickly find and reuse code and solutions.

Possible disadvantages of Docker

  • Complexity
    While Docker can simplify certain aspects of deployment, it adds a layer of complexity to the infrastructure that might require specialized knowledge and training.
  • Security
    Containers share the host OS kernel, which can pose security risks if an attacker gains access to the kernel. Proper isolation and security measures must be implemented.
  • Persistent Data
    Managing persistent data in Docker can be challenging, as containers are ephemeral and the default storage solutions are not always suitable for all applications.
  • Monitoring and Debugging
    Traditional monitoring and debugging tools might not work well with containerized applications, requiring specialized tools and approaches which can complicate troubleshooting.
  • Performance Overhead
    Although lighter than virtual machines, Docker containers can still introduce performance overheads, especially when multiple containers are running simultaneously.
  • Compatibility
    Not all software and systems are fully compatible with Docker, which can limit its use in certain legacy applications and complex environments.

Knative features and specs

  • Serverless Capabilities
    Knative provides powerful serverless capabilities, allowing developers to deploy and manage applications without the need to manage infrastructure. This enables automatic scaling based on demand.
  • Kubernetes Integration
    Because Knative is built on top of Kubernetes, it integrates seamlessly with existing Kubernetes clusters, leveraging Kubernetes features and security policies.
  • Event-Driven Architecture
    Knative offers a robust event-driven architecture that enables applications to efficiently react to events, increasing responsiveness and reducing resource consumption.
  • Flexibility
    Knative provides developers with flexibility to use any programming language, runtime, or framework, allowing diverse applications to be deployed and managed.
  • Open Source Community
    Knative has a strong open-source community, offering extensive resources, continuous development, and a wealth of shared knowledge.

Possible disadvantages of Knative

  • Complexity
    Deploying and managing Knative can introduce complexity, especially for teams unfamiliar with Kubernetes or serverless paradigms.
  • Learning Curve
    There is a significant learning curve associated with Knative, which can be daunting for new users or teams without Kubernetes experience.
  • Resource Intensive
    Running Knative on Kubernetes requires considerable resources, which might not be cost-effective for small-scale applications or organizations.
  • Maturity
    As a relatively new technology, Knative may encounter issues related to maturity, stability, and support compared to more established platforms.
  • Limited Ecosystem
    Although growing, Knative's ecosystem is still limited compared to other serverless solutions, which might restrict available plugins and integrations.

Docker videos

What is Docker in 5 minutes

More videos:

  • Tutorial - What is Docker? Why it's popular and how to use it to save money (tutorial)
  • Review - Real World PHP Dockerfile Review, from a #Docker Captain

Knative videos

What is Knative?

More videos:

  • Review - Introduction to Knative | Cloud Academy
  • Review - Knative a Year Later: Serverless, Kubernetes and You (Cloud Next '19)

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Docker and Knative)
Developer Tools
90 90%
10% 10
Cloud Computing
69 69%
31% 31
Containers As A Service
100 100%
0% 0
Cloud Hosting
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Docker and Knative

Docker Reviews

Exploring 7 Efficient Alternatives to MAMP for Local Development Environments
Though not specifically designed for PHP development, Docker offers a containerized approach to create, deploy, and run applications. It enables easy installation of PHP, web servers, and databases within containers, facilitating quick and consistent development environment setups.
Source: medium.com
Top 6 Alternatives to XAMPP for Local Development Environments
Docker - A containerization platform that allows developers to package applications and their dependencies into containers. Docker Compose can be used to define multi-container application stacks, including web servers, databases, and other services. Features powerful portability and consistency, supports rapid building, sharing, and container management, suitable for...
Source: dev.to
The Top 7 Kubernetes Alternatives for Container Orchestration
Docker uses images as templates to create new containers using Docker engine commands such as Build -t or run -d.
Kubernetes Alternatives 2023: Top 8 Container Orchestration Tools
Docker is an open-source platform for building, managing, deploying containerized applications. Swarm is a native feature in Docker with a group of virtual or physical machines that lets you schedule, cluster, and run Docker applications. It is a Docker alternative for Kubernetes that provides high portability, agility, and high availability.
Top 12 Kubernetes Alternatives to Choose From in 2023
Docker Swarm is a native clustering and orchestration solution provided by Docker, the leading containerization platform.
Source: humalect.com

Knative Reviews

We have no reviews of Knative yet.
Be the first one to post

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Docker should be more popular than Knative. It has been mentiond 73 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Docker mentions (73)

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Knative mentions (16)

  • Building Microservices Using Knative
    As described above, Knative provides a rich ecosystem for managing and executing microservices that can be developed in a variety of programming languages. Any language that can be crafted into a web service and packaged as a kubernetes container is a viable execution candidate for a Knative service. Since 2018, Knative has evolved as a viable microservices platform and in 2022 was accepted by the CNCF at the... - Source: dev.to / 8 months ago
  • A Brief History Of Serverless
    In 2018, Google announced an OSS project called Knative. Knative was meant to be executed on top of Kubernetes and streamline the deployment of applications on the platform. - Source: dev.to / 12 months ago
  • Rethinking Serverless with Flame
    Https://knative.dev/ - (CloudRun API is based on this OSS project). - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Running Serverless Functions on Kubernetes
    Serverless functions are pieces of code that take an HTTP request object and provide a response. With serverless functions, your application is composed of modular functions that respond to events and can be scaled independently. In this article, you learned about Knative and how to run serverless functions on Kubernetes using Knative and the func CLI. You can learn more about Knative on knative.dev, and a cheat... - Source: dev.to / over 2 years ago
  • DevOpsCon Munich 2022 - Human Interactions that Matter
    That night Sebastian Meyen - the chief content officer at S&S Media took the speakers out and I had a great, deep conversation with Zbynek Roubalik - one of the maintainers of both Knative and KEDA. He got me all excited about the GPTchat. I even tried to play with it that same night when I came back to the hotel. But I got bored after 20 minutes. It still feels like talking to a machine... I don't see the threat... - Source: dev.to / over 2 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing Docker and Knative, you can also consider the following products

Kubernetes - Kubernetes is an open source orchestration system for Docker containers

AWS Lambda - Automatic, event-driven compute service

Rancher - Open Source Platform for Running a Private Container Service

Fission.io - Fission.io is a serverless framework for Kubernetes that supports many concepts such as event triggers, parallel execution, and statelessness.

Apache Karaf - Apache Karaf is a lightweight, modern and polymorphic container powered by OSGi.

Google Cloud Run - Bringing serverless to containers