Cannot use vim, vi, nano, yum inside docker container

Question

Started a dockerised application called nginx and then executed bash inside it. To my holy surprise I cannot find vim , vi or even yum inside that container.

Please forgive me as I am very much new to docker and learning.

The below commands can be used to reproduce the issue.

docker run -d --name=my_nginxtemp nginx
docker exec -i -t my_nginxtemp bash
docker commit my_nginxtemp my_nginx

My Host is Ubuntu 16.04 and I am using Latest docker-engine and docker cli

root@jim-Ubuntu1504:/home/jim/web# docker version
Client:
Version: 1.11.2
API version: 1.23
Go version: go1.5.4
Git commit: b9f10c9
Built: Wed Jun 1 22:00:43 2016
OS/Arch: linux/amd64

Server:
Version: 1.11.2
API version: 1.23
Go version: go1.5.4
Git commit: b9f10c9
Built: Wed Jun 1 22:00:43 2016
OS/Arch: linux/amd64
root@jim-Ubuntu1504:/home/jim/web#

Please don't go on my hostname I have upgraded since 15.04 :slight_smile:

root@jim-Ubuntu1504:/home/jim/web# lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 16.04 LTS
Release: 16.04
Codename: xenial
root@jim-Ubuntu1504:/home/jim/web#

Any help would be very much appreciated.

Answer 1

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install vim

I had the same issue. I followed the simple two steps above and it worked like a charm.

Answer 2

To my holy surprise I cannot find vim , vi or even yum inside that container.

It simply depends on the nginx image and its base image: if vim never was installed there, your container won't find it.

You could build your own image, starting from nginx, and adding the software you need.

FROM nginx
RUN apt-get update
RUN apt-get install vim