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6 posts tagged with "docker"

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Docker Out of Docker: Running Interactive Web Applications for Data Analysis

· 10 min read
Thanh-Giang Tan Nguyen
Founder at RIVER

Running interactive web applications like RStudio, JupyterLab, and Code Server in containers is a powerful way to provide reproducible analysis environments. However, users often need to spawn additional containerized tools from within these applications. Docker out of Docker (DooD) elegantly solves this by allowing containers to access the host's Docker daemon. This post explains how to set up DooD for interactive web applications and why it's the right approach for bioinformatics workflows.

Containers on HPC: From Docker to Singularity and Apptainer

· 9 min read
Thanh-Giang Tan Nguyen
Founder at RIVER

Container technologies have revolutionized software deployment and reproducibility in scientific computing. However, traditional Docker faces significant limitations in High-Performance Computing (HPC) environments. This post explores why Docker struggles on HPC systems and introduces modern alternatives like Docker rootless, Singularity, and Apptainer.

Containers in Bioinformatics: Community Tooling and Efficient Docker Building

· 21 min read
Thanh-Giang Tan Nguyen
Founder at RIVER

Docker containers are revolutionizing bioinformatics by automating reproducibility and portability across platforms. But what problems can they actually solve? This post shows real-world applications of containers in bioinformatics workflows, then guides you through the simplest possible ways to use, build and debug them.

Containers in Bioinformatics: Community Tooling and Efficient Docker Building

· 21 min read
Thanh-Giang Tan Nguyen
Founder at RIVER

Docker containers are revolutionizing bioinformatics by automating reproducibility and portability across platforms. But what problems can they actually solve? This post shows real-world applications of containers in bioinformatics workflows, then guides you through the simplest possible ways to use, build and debug them.

Bioinformatics Workflow Template: Standardizing Python Pipelines with Modular Design

· 13 min read
Thanh-Giang Tan Nguyen
Founder at RIVER

Building reproducible bioinformatics pipelines is hard. Every project starts from scratch with its own testing, CI/CD, and deployment strategy. What if you could clone a template, add your analysis tools, and be ready to go?

This post introduces a standardized bioinformatics workflow template featuring consistent testing, CI/CD, and project structure. Developed from real production experience with bioinfor-wf-template, this template reduces setup time from days to minutes, ensures research reproducibility, and promotes modular, reusable code. It is Python-based and ideal for proof-of-concept projects. Support for more advanced and widely adopted bioinformatics frameworks (such as Snakemake and Nextflow) is planned, applying the same core principles while leveraging their native testing systems.

Running GitHub Actions Locally with act: 5x Faster Development

· 12 min read
Thanh-Giang Tan Nguyen
Founder at RIVER

GitHub Actions are powerful for automating bioinformatics pipelines, but waiting 5-10 minutes for each cloud run is painful during development. act lets you run GitHub Actions workflows locally on your machine in seconds, slashing feedback time by 5x.

In this post, we'll explore act, a command-line tool that runs GitHub Actions locally using Docker. Perfect for testing ML pipelines, gene expression analysis, and CI/CD workflows before pushing to GitHub.