Download Windows Nano Server
Bree Killoy
It's easy to fall on the temptation of comparing image sizes for comparison sake. However, just like on regular servers, you should not simply install your system and let it go. Containers are subject to Patch Tuesday and in fact, Microsoft updates these base images every month with security updates. That means you should be updating your production systems composed by containers every month to leverage these security updates. The way you perform that is a topic for another blog post, but the point here is that given these monthly changes, the size of the base container images will vary. Some months we gain some, some months we lose some. The fact that these images have around 290MB (Nano Server), 4.8GB (Server Core), and 11.2GB (Server) should give you a ballpark on what to expect in terms of size. Furthermore, these image layers are compacted for pulling operations (download) so the size that does over the wire is smaller than what you see on disk.
Windows Server Core and Nanoserver are the most common base images to target. The key difference between these images is that Nanoserver has a significantly smaller API surface. PowerShell, WMI, and the Windows servicing stack are absent from the Nanoserver image.
Nanoserver was built to provide just enough API surface to run apps that have a dependency on .NET core or other modern open source frameworks. As a tradeoff to the smaller API surface, the Nanoserver image has a significantly smaller on-disk footprint than the rest of the Windows base images. Keep in mind that you can always add layers on top of Nano Server as you see fit. For an example of this check out the .NET Core Nano Server Dockerfile.
"Nano Server is a remotely administered server operating system optimized for private clouds and datacenters. It is similar to Windows Server in Server Core mode, but significantly smaller, has no local logon capability, and only supports 64-bit applications, tools, and agents. It takes up far less disk space, sets up significantly faster, and requires far fewer updates and restarts than Windows Server. When it does restart, it restarts much faster."
It becomes extremely fast to provision new web server machines when using the generated vhd(x) image that has IIS already baked-in. On my office desktop machine, I was able to create new VMs, do offline specialization, boot up and be serving web requests all in about 25 seconds. Trying to do the same with Server Core would've taken many times that.
Nano Server is a 'headless' OS - there is no GUI on the server itself. PowerShell is front and center of the Nano management experience. Of course this means you will be able to manage IIS on Nano using our IIS PowerShell cmdlets.
Nano Server is a clean server platform for the future and so we currently have no plans to include the older legacy WebAdministration module at this time. Instead we will provide the new IISAdministration module.
Windows Server Core and Nano Server are both useful tools for different use cases. The former is a more general-purpose server OS that can run a wide range of workloads. Nano Server is a specialized platform optimized for running modern applications and microservices in cloud and container environments.
Microsoft calls the full deployment of its server operating system the Server with Desktop Experience. As the name indicates, this installation provides the traditional Windows layout with menus accessed via a mouse or keyboard, similar to a standard Windows 10 system. Many administrators prefer the GUI deployment for the familiar desktop layout, which makes it easier to manage in some instances. In some cases, this full server OS deployment is the only option to run certain applications. For example, System Center Server Virtual Machine Manager 2019 and SharePoint Server 2019 both rely on the Server with Desktop Experience to function.
Server Core can be used as a host for containers or Hyper-V VMs or to run infrastructure workloads, including file servers, domain controllers and domain name servers. While Microsoft recommends Server Core as the default deployment option, it only recently began to support the use of Exchange Server on Server Core.
Microsoft added a new server deployment option in Windows Server 2016 called Nano Server. The company promoted Nano Server as a successor to Server Core, as a smaller, even more secure headless deployment. Microsoft said Nano Server was optimal for many of the same infrastructure workloads handled by Server Core, such as an IIS web server or as a host for containers or Hyper-V VMs.
There is a powershell module called Posh-SSH. If you install the module you've a New-SSHSession cmdlet. See this link. Based on this you can SSH to your Nano Server installation. To add SSH server capability to Nano Server you've to install Win32-OpenSSH (the link points to the install instructions).
Most of the talks and examples I can found so far are the ones that application containers running on top of the Nano Server does not need any GUI functionality (e.g., IIS server) -- i.e., normally those application containers run Docker images are built from Nano Server images FROM microsoft/nanoserver
My question is whether a Nano server host may be able to host a GUI application such as Word within a container running on top of it. (Theoretically it feels feasible because as long as the Docker image of the container include the GUI package, but I am not sure)
I need to run a nano server docker image in windows server 2016, but whenever I am trying to pull the image is going to retrying..mode I need some suggestion to solve it.The command is : docker pull mcr.microsoft.com/windows/nanoserver:10.0.14393.953
Today, after pulling and running mcr.microsoft.com/dotnet/framework/sdk:latest and mcr.microsoft.com/windows/servercore:2004-amd64 (both of which worked), I am now able to run the image mcr.microsoft.com/windows/nanoserver:2004-amd64 that was giving me trouble yesterday. I don't know what fixed it. Maybe some image layer was missing that got filled in by pulling another image using the same layer?
Is there something I am doing wrong here? Is there something special with windows server 2016 and docker that means -d does not work? Starting a container with -d is kinda fundamental I would think...
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