Where is the dockerd (Docker Daemon) in macOS?

Question

I'm trying to understand how the Docker Daemon works on my macOS. Can anyone confirm that it's - /Applications/Docker.app/Contents/MacOS/com.docker.supervisor ? How come it's not as simple as finding it in Windows and Linux?

Dockerd paths -

• Windows C:\Program Files\Docker\Docker\resources\dockerd.exe
• Linux /usr/bin/dockerd
• macOS /Applications/Docker.app/Contents/MacOS/com.docker.supervisor - Assumption, need confirmation

Answer 1

The dockerd process doesn't run on MacOS. It runs in an embedded Linux VM. So you shouldn't find it with the normal Mac tools. Instead what you'll find are apps used to configure and control the VM. For an idea of what's running inside that VM, have a look at the linuxkit project, in particular the docker-for-mac.yml example. However, note that this is only an example and doesn't include the closed source code that makes up Docker Desktop.

To configure the dockerd in Docker for Mac, you can update the daemon.json file from the UI.